Fr Billy Swan said that “there is evidence that Ireland is ‘re-paganising’ or reverting to the worship of false gods like it did before we accepted the Christian faith back in the 5th Century”.
“Ireland has experimented with paganism and superstition before. Moving away from the light of Christ and into darkness is inevitably leading to a breakdown of civilisation, the family and chaos in society in general,” according to Fr Swan.
“It leads to confusion about what is true and false, what is right and wrong and a bleaker future for our youth who are longing for hope. The way things are going, far from it being the established order to rebel against, traditional Christian faith is becoming the last countercultural force that has the confidence and resolve to resist this slide into despair.”
Prof. Patricia Casey, professor emeritus of psychiatry at UCD, told The Irish Catholic: “The more serious thing, which isn’t to do with Halloween directly, is the dabbling in the occult generally – and Halloween is linked in with occult tendencies.
“The occult is very dangerous because it takes people into all kinds of things like devil worship, witchcraft, pornography – people actually working in tandem with the devil. It leads people into very dark things and into a very dark perspective on life that worships evil, because that’s what devil worship is about, it’s worshipping evil and that’s obviously very concerning.”
Regarding the future impact this may have on young people Prof. Casey said that it “would certainly lead to psychological problems like nightmares, very negative thoughts, confusion about right and wrong, anxiety and those kinds of things. It could lead to depression as well, because if people are engaged in the occult they may well get into pornography and that’s very much associated with depression and anxiety”.
Writing in this week’s paper, columnist Breda O’Brien said: “Modern Hallowe’en strips the Christian meditation on the fleeting nature of life and the need to pray for the dead, and even the Celtic wariness of the dead and the need to appease them, from Hallowe’en. It leaves an ugly, commercial, and hollow substitute in its place.”
Quoting Pope Francis, Fr Swan said: “‘Our secularised world is teeming with magicians, occultism, spiritism, astrologers and satanic sects. If we kick the devil out the door, he tries to return through the window. If we overcome him with faith, he seeks to return through superstition.’ Let’s not be naïve about the presence and power of evil. May all forms of darkness, evil, deceit and worship of false gods be dispelled by the true light of Jesus Christ, risen from the dead for ‘Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness but have the light of life’ (John 8:12).”