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Tuesday, October 6, 2015

The Halloween conundrum

Zombies, ghosts, witches, vampires and mutants cursed with supernatural powers; you’d expect primitive cultures to go there. So why, in striking contrast to Western society’s scientific rationalism, is every conceivable supernatural manifestation celebrated each year by educated people who are supposedly convinced otherwise? In fact, Hollywood produces a steady stream of paranormal themes because it sells; movie viewers can’t seem to get enough.

Why?
Halloween

 Consider this analysis from BloomburgView:

There’s a reason for the pull of the pagan. In the U.S., we’ve been vigorously scrubbing our schools and other public spaces of traces of monotheistic religion for many decades now. Such scrubbing leaves a vacuum. The great self-deception of modern life is that nothing will be pulled into that vacuum.”

Indeed.

Some might conclude such a vacuum exists because we humans are still early in our evolutionary process, but it seems more likely that God created us for a vital relationship with himself and, lacking that, we fill the void with crass imitations. This fascination with the supernatural is a form of age-old paganism in contemporary dress.

“But it’s all in fun,” some say. Perhaps. That very statement seems to reflect a desire to rationalize, somehow admitting we’re not entirely comfortable with this fixation. It is true, we do yearn for heroes, for some supernatural savior to rescue us from the hardships of this fallen world. Some would tell us that long ago mankind created a story of one such otherworldly figure who came to save us. The temptation exists to file that account with all the other superhero stories.

Jesus, unlike some ghost who leaves no footprint, fulfilled prophecies written centuries before and changed the course of history, with his own contemporaries documenting his impact. The question is, will we align ourselves with the current cultural worldview about supernatural forces, or will we accept Jesus as the real answer to our need for a supernatural savior?

David Goodman
© David G. Goodman
President, Entrust

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