The Masks We Wear

Halloween is considered by many to have its origins in the Celtic festival of Samhain which was sometimes regarded as the Celtic New Year, a celebration of the end of the “lighter half” of the year and the beginning of the “darker half” of the year. The ancient Celts believed that the veil between the physical and the non-physical realms was thinnest at this time allowing spirits, both good and evil, to pass through. They wore costumes and masks as a means of protection. Disguised as evil spirits they could “blend in” and avoid being recognized as human.

The tradition of observing Halloween or Hallowe’en, a contraction of the original “All Hallows’ Evening,” was also influenced in the west by the Christian church. It is observed as the evening before All Saints Day, a time for honoring all the saints and praying for those recently departed souls who are in purgatory and have not yet reached Heaven. The custom of wearing costumes has been linked to All Saints Day by Prince Sorie Conteh, senior minister at Carleton United Church, St. Catharines, Ontario Canada and multi-faith chaplain at Niagara College, who wrote:

"It was traditionally believed that the souls of the departed wandered the earth until All Saints' Day, and All Hallows' Eve provided one last chance for the dead to gain vengeance on their enemies before moving to the next world. In order to avoid being recognized by any soul that might be seeking such vengeance, people would don masks or costumes to disguise their identities.”

In both traditions there is a common theme – there are souls wandering around somewhere between the realms of Heaven and Hell, a.k.a. “light and dark” or “good and evil.” In the Christian tradition this realm is knows as purgatory. Purgatory is understood to be a condition of purification or temporary punishment that prepares souls for Heaven.

In Unity, we believe that both ‘heaven’ and ‘hell’ are states of consciousness. Heaven is a state of consciousness often referred to as Christ consciousness, which each of us may attain. It is the consciousness of knowing Oneness with the Divine. Hell, on the other hand, is the consciousness of duality in which one experiences the suffering created by a mind that believes in separation. We are constantly at a point of choice: we can choose heaven or hell in any moment. However, many, if not most of us, walk around in state of “purgatory,” not quite in hell, but not yet enjoying heaven. We seem to believe, perhaps not consciously, that we do not yet deserve heaven, that we must be punished, tested or tried in order to demonstrate our worthiness. We condemn ourselves to living in a perpetual state of purgatory, testing and “purifying” ourselves. We are those souls who are seeking the light, attempting to reach heaven.

As with the tradition of Halloween in which we wear masks and costumes to protect us from evil spirits, we, as a daily ritual, don masks and costumes disguising ourselves as the roles we play as human beings, often times believing that we are the masks we wear, not trying to fool the disembodied spirits of the dead, but in an attempt to hide our Truth from ourselves and others. While this allows us to “blend in” and to avoid standing out from the crowd, it prevents us from coming into the full recognition of our true selves and embracing the Christ consciousness, our ultimate potential.

In order to come into the recognition of our Truth, we must be willing to acknowledge the masks we wear and investigate them to determine for ourselves if we are allowing them to hide our Light. Until we are willing to remove the masks and see ourselves as we truly are, we will continue to believe that we are unworthy. When we recognize our Truth, we will know that no suffering is needed, and we will release ourselves from purgatory and enter fully into the consciousness of “heaven.”

I encourage us all to observe this Halloween as an opportunity to free ourselves from the limitations of our masks and costumes, and as we awaken to know that we are not souls living in purgatory, but saints who have arisen in Christ consciousness to celebrate Heaven.

Happy Halloween! 

Glorious All Saints Day!