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Families want church to offer choice at Halloween 2009

The Church of England and The Children’s Society are joining forces to transform Halloween 2009 and this is your chance to get involved.

 

Halloween Choice 2009 – what it will look like

The Halloween Choice focus will be on celebrating heroes (a twist on All Saints).

 

The celebration

The essence of these activities involves a church celebration of All Saints and a procession of light ending in a community party. Children can dress up in costumes – maybe as modern-day heroes or ‘saints’ such as nurses and firemen and still enjoy the thrill of exploring their neighbourhood after dark – as with current Halloween practice.

 

At churches or schools running Halloween Choice events, the  heroic professions (police, teachers, etc.) can be invited to attend a Halloween Choice service/party/event. Children can be invited to dress up as heroes, have fun, worship, and collect a ‘treat’ for the Children’s Society. 

 

By holding an activity and arranging a collection for The Children's Society (see resources collection box) you are helping to make childhood better for all children.

 

Apple giveaway

The HalloweenChoice logo is an apple. Why not order some free stickers to put on apples. The apples can then be given away to the public or parents to promote your HalloweenChoice event. Order here.

 

Resources are free and can be ordered here.

 

Click here for The Children's Society Halloween Choice site.

 

Suggested service activities

Start at a local church for a service

This could be the central and only activity for the evening or could end in children’s Eucharist and or Baptismal responses.

 

Build on ‘being a saint’, and what it means to be a modern-day ‘saint’ or hero. This is an opportunity for a collection to be held for The Children's Society, maybe bringing in the theme of apples.

 

Procession

Walk from church to another building, ie another church or a community hall, or into and around the church.

 

Make it a candle or lantern-lit procession, involving the community in spreading the light during this special evening and joining in the procession of saints singing ‘When the Saints go marching in’. There is an opportunity to incorporate points of local interest points for educational purposes.

 

End at another venue for a party

A party could be held with ‘bonfire-like’ food, such as bangers and mash or baked potatoes. Quizzes, puzzles and games with underpinning educational aims could be held. See www.chpublishing.co.uk and type 'parties' in the search box for ideas for light- themed or All Saints parties.

 

All Saints or Heroes parties are a great excuse to look at the lives of some of the more obscure, as well as popular saints.  The party could be based around a church’s or school’s own patronal saint, a particular saint or the lives of many saints.  Food and games could be linked into the theme, eg baking ‘halo’ cakes. The idea is simple, plan an act of worship that allows children to make a donation to the Children’s Society and have some fun. During the service they can be given an apple. This can be used in a party afterwards, if you plan to have one.

 

Your Christingle team may want to help

If this is your first year at running a Halloween Choice event, we suggest setting up a small team of people to help (maybe your usual Christingle team, Mothers’ Union members or local school).

 

How others have run alternative events...

The leaders of the Junior Church at St. John’s, Moston, write about their events…

 

Each year at St. John’s, Moston we offer an alternative for the children and parents of our junior church.  We seek to contrast the dark, scary image of Halloween by holding a light party aimed at spreading the true meaning of the Christian celebration of All Hallow’s eve, where light and happiness are at the top of the agenda.

 

Before the party itself we as junior church leaders prepare the children to celebrate the light of Christ and we invite all of the children to come to the light party dressed in white or light clothes.  On the day of the party we commence with a short time of prayer with a lit candle as our focus.  This candle remains lit throughout the course of the party.  We encourage all of the children to join in the prayers in their own way. Following the prayers - the fun begins!

 

The party consists of food, games and lots of fun. We do play traditional games such as bobbing for apples with causes lots of laughter as can be seen from our photographs.  We also do other sorts of games such as musical chairs etc. and lots of other activities. We also try to have food that is light in colour.  Every year the children thoroughly enjoy the party.  The party itself usually lasts about 1 - 1 ½ hours.  Our aim is that the children go away from the party sure in the knowledge that Christ’ light will surround them, uphold them in their daily lives and protect them along the way.

 

Here’s looking forward to this year’s party!

 

How it all began

In 2006 the Bishop of Bolton challenged the supermarkets to offer more wholesome merchandise to families at this time of year. The public interest in this issue led to the development of the Halloween Choice campaign, which not only tries to get supermarkets to offer choice, but also tries to give parents a choice of events to attend at Halloween.

 

In September 2007, a national Church of England survey revealed a surprising fact: 60% of young parents wanted, or would be open to, alternatives to the supermarket ‘dress your kids as a serial killer’ version of Halloween. The findings indicated that if churches and schools were to offer a fun event on the evening of Halloween, then parents would come.

 

In 2007, the Church of England launched the ‘Halloween Choice’ campaign website. It offered parishes and schools a way of running alternative Halloween events. The site included a fundraising button for The Children’s Society so that people could donate their Halloween ‘treat’ and download a poster for their window to say that they had already given a treat to charity. You may have seen in the press that a number of bishops and clergy handed out apples to advertise the website.

 

The success of the Halloween Choice 2007 campaign has led to a unique partnership between the Church and England and the Children’s Society.

 

A Church of England partnership with the Children’s Society

Over the past twelve months, a group of Diocesan children’s work advisers and communications officers have been working with The Children’s Society to develop a campaign to raise money for the charity and resources to help churches and schools offer a range of fun, lively and different activities on 31 October – the Friday of half-term week. The Children’s Society will be using its networks to promote events and fundraising. The potential is quite large, and we estimate 62,000 children attending Halloween Choice events this year.