The 7 Desires of Halloween: #3 Mystery

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“It was the secrets of heaven and earth that I desired to learn; and whether it was the outward substance of things or the inner spirit of nature and the mysterious soul of man that occupied me, still my inquiries were directed to the metaphysical, or in its highest sense, the physical secrets of the world. (Mary Shelley, Frankenstein)

Mysteries can be divided into two categories: natural and supernatural. 

Natural mysteries are that which can be known and understood materially: they follow the rules we understand the universe to operate by.  Just because they are comprehensible though, does not mean we understand them yet.  And this can lend them an air of the supernatural.

For instance, in Shelly’s Frankenstein, the means by which the monster is created follows natural laws.  Victor Frankenstein does not delve into books of the occult to provide the monster with an animating spirit, he studies anatomy and biology.  However, his refusal to provide us with the specifics due to fear of someone else repeating his experiment is a stroke of narrative genius.  It turns Frankenstein from a classical tragedy into a Halloween tragedy.  The secret of life remains a mystery.  And that is its appeal.  When it comes to storytelling, it is often more appealing not to know. 

As someone who believes God is a God of Truth, this bothers me somewhat. Shouldn’t knowledge always be preferable to not knowing.  Don’t human beings hunger for knowledge?  How can we also then hunger for mystery?

I think the seeming discrepancy here lies in the difference between knowledge and truth.  All knowledge must be true by definition.  It is possible to believe something that is false, but it is impossible to *know* something that is false.

(I tried really hard to find a citation for this epistemological assertion; I’m pretty sure its Augustine, but I couldn't find the quote I was looking for.  The citation for this image though is https://xkcd.com/285/ )

However, it is possible for something to be true without us knowing it.  After all, we are not God.  Even if every natural law were understood in its entirety by every human being, there would still be things we did not know.  Our brains are limited. 

Especially when you're trying to focus at work but you're really outlining blog articles in your head.

This brings us to supernatural mysteries.  They cannot be understood via natural laws.  The church uses mystery in a theological context for everything from the life of Christ to the nature of the Trinity.  Despite what it may sound like, this is not a theological cop-out.  An infinite God outside of space and time, not a being but BE-ING himself, must necessarily be uncontainable by the human mind.  (My theology might be a little off here, but you get the idea).

As the song Amazing Grace states that “when we’ve been there 10,000 years / bright shining as the sun / we’ve no less days, to sing God’s praise / then when we first begun.”  Similarly, if we are spending eternity with an infinite God, after 10,000 years (insomuch as time has any meaning in eternity) we will have no fewer things to learn about God too.

Thus we can resolve our desire for knowledge with our desire for mystery without sacrificing our desire for truth.  Both reflect the same desire: the desire for infinity.  We can learn and yet still desire for there to be more to learn.  To quote Brandon Sanderson, “There’s always another secret.”  And thank God for that.

Wanderer above the Sea of Fog by Caspar David Friedrich

PS: The finite (if far from fully understood cosmos) is not enough to fill the infinite human drive for knowledge that can only be fulfilled by an infinite God.  If someone finds belief in God impossible, even hostile deities might be preferable to the closed system of a finite cosmos.

 I think this is one of the things that makes Lovecraft so appealing to modern geeks.  Anyone else as controversial as Lovecraft would long since have been purged from the conversation of urban progressives.  But Lovecraft still has a huge following despite himself.  Why?  Because he (and like-minded writers) infused pulp sci-fi with supernatural mysteries.  The Great Old Ones are incomprehensible to the human mind.  Just seeing the tiniest glimpse or reading about their true nature in a book drives Lovecraft’s narrators a little mad. 

However, unlike a Christian worldview, there is no God to keep them in check. In Lovecraft, the true nature of reality is entirely indifferent to man, but also incomprehensible.  This makes Lovecraft’s narrators are the “materialist magicians” predicted by C.S. Lewis in The Screwtape Letters. And that brings us to our next essay.

An Allhallowtide Blessing

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An Allhallowtide Blessing

by Joseph Salvatore Knipper

(Originally Published in Catholic Artist Connection)

May your will be one with the LORD's,

That the forces of Hell flee from you;

May your prayers be tied with the Saints',

That the Holy Dead intercede for you;

May those who have fallen asleep

Receive their succor in prayer from you,

That death may lose its sting,

The night forfeit all fear for you.

A Holy and Fun Allhallowtide to all of you.  Thank you for reading.

--Epimetheus

The 7 Desires of Halloween: #4 Chaos

Image Credit: David Lloyd

“Mischief Managed”—Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

I am largely conservative by temperament.

While my politics run along the whole spectrum, my emotional reaction is usually: if it's not broke, don’t fix it. If it is broke, wait to make sure it’s really broken, and then try to live with it anyway because it’s probably not as broken as you think.

Overused Meme

So, I don’t want to blow it all up. But let’s pretend I did. Let’s talk about mischief. Let’s talk about chaos.

I believe that the attraction of chaos is largely a desire for justice. Chaos is generally desired by those with less power and perpetrated against those with more. When it is violent, we call it terrorism. When it is perpetrated for a specific end but largely peaceful, we call it a protest or sit-in. When it is done for humor, we call it a prank. And when it is done as a celebration of youthful rebellion, we call it mischief.

The day before Halloween is called “Mischief Night” in some areas (also common: Devil’s Night”) As Wikipedia put it, some places have separated the “tricks” from the “treats” of Halloween.” What is the appeal of TPing your neighbor’s house or egging their car? Not much, which is why I think it is mostly done by teenagers. Teenagers, being largely powerless (expect in physical capacity) find oppression everywhere they look, and not only the imaginary oppression of loving but strict parents. They are old enough to see injustice in the world, yet not old enough to be overwhelmed by it. This is why many social justice movements start with the young. They have the energy and the (at least seemingly) fresh perspective necessary to engage injustice with gusto. What the young lack is power. They want to correct a wrong *now*--as they well should--but they are not established enough within the world’s structures of power in order to do so. When you combine a seemingly fresh injustice with the seeming hopelessness of working within the system, you get a desire to burn it down. You get revolution. When you don’t even have that power, you lash out at whoever is near who has more power. Thus, November 1st suburbanites find themselves heading to the car wash.

I believe this desire for justice through chaos is one of the appeals of zombie apocalypses. Though in theory a hellscape of gun-toting libertarian survivors against a faceless foe would seem to be more of a right-leaning fantasy, zombie apocalypses are popular with everyone. Corrupt society has been wiped away. The enemy is clearly visible and can be eliminated by straightforward and violently effective means. It’s a reflection of the desire to start "fresh".

Ah, carefree escapism.

I believe revolutionary desires can be helpful for maintaining the health of a society. There are certain things so wrong that to not radically (though peacefully) combat would be a wrong in itself.

However, the important thing to remember is the revolutions are chemotherapy, not vitamins. They are a radical attempt to save a society that is about to lose it soul, not a daily corrective measure. Chaos becomes unhealthy if it is violent or perpetual. The ultimate goal of revolution is to fix society and restore it, not to scrap it. The chaos of a perpetual revolution cannot create a better life for humanity any more than stagnation can. As a mentor of mine once said to me “Winners don’t get rid of everything and start from square one every time they make a mistake. They use what they have to get more.” He was speaking about jobs and income, but the same thing I think applies to society. Fortunately, as youths become adults, most of them learn they can do more within a system than without.

However, some people become bitter at justice's perceived slow pace and resort to nihilism. This is reflected in horror fiction by the Lovecraftian-style apocalypse: alien gods come and eat all our souls. Everyone is eternally undead in permanent torment. But this nihilistic deus ex machina merely shows our desire for Christ’s Parousia.

When Christ comes at the end of time, he will correct all the injustices of the world, (and some of us who considered ourselves just will have things flipped on our head. As CS Lewis says in classic British understatement: “There will be surprises.”) This is not to say we should tell the oppressed to just wait until heaven; we are all called to live justly here and now. But starting history anew is reserved to God alone.

I think this cry for Christ’s justice also explains the very strange associate of Guy Fawkes (a terrorist theocrat) with anarchy (a philosophical system that believes in abolishing governments, historically using terrorist tactics). Alan Moore may not have intended it, but both the violent anarchist and the violent theocrat want society to change for the better. Unfortunately, they are willing to make it worse in order to do so.

The chaos of Halloween, whether the nihilism of an apocalypse or the minor pranks of trick-or-treaters reflects, ultimately, a desire for God’s justice. The desire for justice cries up from every human heart. If I may be permitted to be biblical for a minute “The prayer of the lowly pierces the clouds[...]God will indeed not delay” (Sirach 35: 21a, 22a). When people fell God is seeming to delay, they often take matters into their own hands, and sometime use immoral means. Compared to some forms chaos, maybe some toilet paper on the roof is a small price to pay.

I can't help be impressed by the time investment. 

PS: On final aspect of Chaos that I almost made its own essay is chaotic appearances. From The Addams Family to Hellboy to Frankenstein, story after story affirms the humanity of those who look different than us. Writing this on the subway often in the same car as crippled homeless people, missing teeth or covered in skin diseases, I can’t but think how much the world needs this lesson. The world is full of strange beauty. As Gerard Manley Hopkins says “Christ plays in ten thousand places, / Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his /To the Father through the features of men's faces."

The 7 Desires of Halloween: #5 Eros

Undying Love by Mike Bell

"When we're together darling, every night is Halloween" --Gomez to Morticia Addams

By my current approximation, the audience for my blog so far is 50% progressive acting friends and 50% my mother. Alright, this should be super awkward; let's talk about God and sex.

I did not want to write this article for several reasons. First, human sexuality is such an emotionally and politically charged topic, I have no idea how to keep the focus on that which is relevant to Halloween. In order to show maximum love and respect for my brothers and sisters who disagree with me on the Theology of the Body without being misconstrued (either as a cafeteria Catholic or a puritan), it might be wise to backtrack so far that I would never get to the parts that relate to Halloween. Secondly, unlike most of the other desires, I'm not certain that I have anything to say on the topic that is wasn't said better by St. John Paul II.  Thirdly, I think the best way to discuss theology with love is to talk about personal experience, and I have no interest in doing so for this particular topic. Fourthly, I usually write these articles on my work laptop because it is small and portable.

As you can see, our filters were flagged when you used the word "sex" 27 times.

So I beg of you to be forgiving of this articles many flaws. I will do my best in the time I have. If you know me personally and this article upsets you, feel free to talk to me about it over a cider.

Okay, let's focus on 3 things: modesty, dualism, and candy.

Modesty: Anyone who thinks Eros isn't relevant to Halloween (for adults at least), hasn't been paying attention. From sexy vampires to sexy, well, everything else, the point of Halloween for a certain subset of the population seems to be to show as much skin as possible. Now, before I am accused of “*^&% shaming” (gosh, I find that term crude), let me say that it is extremely unjust that only women are called out for what they wear by society. If we are going to call for greater modesty, it cannot be based on gender at all. I also do not believe that it is my business what people who are not under my care wear at all (outside the realm of indecent exposure laws). And since I am not a father and my goddaughter is 2 years old, there is really no one on the face of planet earth whose dress habits are any of my business. If someone upsets me by what he or she wears, the only thing relevant is what in me caused me to be upset by it.

That being said, I do believe that each of us has a call to dress modestly. What does modesty mean in a theological sense? Within the norms of our society, we are called to avoid dressing in such a way as to deliberately incite a non-spouse to lust. This means that what is immodest in Romania might not be immodest in Mexico. It is our motivation while taking into account cultural norms that determines modesty. Not some universal principle like “ankles are okay but knees are not.”

Jonathan Edwards isn't even okay with your lascivious ankles.

Dualism: When it comes to Catholic teaching on human sexuality, most people (in my experience) get about 80% of the “what” right and about 80% of the “why” wrong. I believe this is due to the constant tendency towards Manicheism that infects all branches of American Christianity. Manicheism (whether it's called that or puritanism or a dozen other names) is a dualistic heresy which believes that the body is evil and the spirit is good. In its extreme, even legitimate pleasures are suspicious and must be eschewed. When Manicheism seeps into Christianity, people are told from the pulpit they must either starve the desires of the body or be damned. For most of American Christianity, people were content to either starve or laugh at the preachers and pursue their own interests covertly. Around the 1960s, however, they got tired of the convert part, and left the pews in droves.

Candy: Now modern society espouses a different falsehood—an oversimplify version of hedonism--what Christopher West calls “The Fast Food Diet.” (“The Starvation Diet” and “The Fast Food Diet” are from his book Fill These Hearts, which heavily influenced this article). But since this is a Halloween article, let's call it "the Candy Diet". The candy diet says have as much of any type of candy you want without stealing someone else's candy. Darn, that sounded dirty. Oh no wait, this an article about Eros. I guess it was supposed to.

I need a break from this article: here is a picture of a baby sloth sticking its tongue out.

However, this is deeply unhealthy for the human person, as much so as if we really only ate candy.  It will kill us eventually.

According to West, a Catholic is not to subscribe to either diet.  We are to live in the discomfort in between the two.  (This is not saying "lust and then don't do" or "lust and then do", but rather an acknowledgement that there is both richness and challenges enough in the proper use of our sexual faculty.)  Our desire for one another prefigures our desire for Christ himself, and we should thus treat it with the dignity it deserves.

Whether we are a monk in a monastery or a married couple, we must walk the difficult balance of using our sexuality properly, neither trying to bury it or indulge it, but surrendering it to God for his use at every moment.  Misuse of sexuality blocks us from a full relationship with God. We cannot relate to God if the relational faculty God gave us is misused. But if we align our sexuality with God's will for us, then all our relationships require a peace and richness that foreshadows the banquet of heaven.  In other words, we need vegetables and protein, not candy.

Writer's-Cramp Conclusion: 
The Church's seeming list of "don't" is not an effort to curb self-expression or limit our freedom, any more than a hang glider limits our freedom if we were to jump of a cliff.

The goal of theology of the body is to align us fully with our true selves as beings who love.  Human sexuality, like everything God created, is good. But also like everything God created, it can be misused.

I don't think modern culture disagrees that it can be misused, it just disagrees the how.  Everyone wants to be the most fully good, beautiful, and true human he or she can be.  Conscious of the many sins and flaws of those in the Church (including myself), I still believe that the Catholic Church provides the most accurate road map.

See, I barely got to Halloween at all, and I didn't explain the Church teaching other than in the most cursory way.  Let me conclude a different way then: be Morticia and Gomez, not Buffy and Spike.  

The 7 Desires of Halloween: #6 Danger

Halloween Dare by Tom Shropshire

“An army of nightmares, huh? Let's get this party started.”—Cabin in the Woods

“Death comes to us all,” I told the couple.  “Chop, chop.  No point delaying the inevitable.”  It was dark, and the screams of other victims could be heard echoing through the labyrinth, along with breaking glass, mad laughter, and animal squeals. 

“No, you go first,” laughed the woman, throwing her gentleman in front of her as they faced a dark corridor lined with femur bones.  He smirked, but the smirk metastasized to a rigor mortis as the sudden blast of an alarm caused him to stumble.  “I don’t want to go first.  You go first!”  They shuffled their order for a bit, alternately laughing and squealing, but eventually the gentleman led into the dark.  I turned to the next victims.

Shameless Plug

Hour after hour, night after night, this same little skit plays out in a hundred variations.  People show up to the haunted house I work at and demand to experience fear.  To be anxious.  To feel, for the space of 20 or so minutes, that danger is just around the corner.  And when you don’t deliver, they become irate.  (I remember receiving much verbal abuse at my last haunt over insufficient terror.  It had extraordinary production quality, but being outdoors, there was nothing we could do about the Manhattan skyline silhouetting every sneaking spectre, spoiling the surprise.)

Monsters never apologize for alliteration

At first glance, this is pure madness.  Many people (including myself, at times) see very expensive professionals who prescribe very expensive medication that they may have less anxiety in their lives. 

I have a theory as to why people seek out danger on Halloween, but first let’s make sure we have all the information.  Let’s look at two other ways people seek out danger: slasher flicks and what most people call scary stories, but I’ll call “Halloween tragedies.”

By Halloween tragedies, I mean a story where the protagonist has many opportunities to turn back, but still marches towards his or her doom.  I’m thinking of “Jerusalem’s Lot” or “The Shadow of Innsmouth” or “The Tell-Tale Heart.”  In Lovecraft’s “The Shadow over Innsmouth” for instance, the protagonist receives repeated warnings not to dig into the mysteries of the town, and ends up discovering his own doomed heritage as a result of the failure to heed these warnings.  He doesn’t die, per se, but the self he knows does end.  King’s “Jerusalem’s Lot” has similar warnings, and more direct consequences.  As for Poe’s unreliable narrators, I think we are all familiar with their foolhardy commitment to homicide despite many opportunities to repent.  In a classical tragedy, everyone of significance dies at the end except the audience.   And this relief  we feel as the audience at having “survived” is what some interpret as the source of Aristotle’s catharsis.  We feel hope and anxiety for the wayward protagonists until the very end, and then, suddenly, it’s over and we have triumphed by virtue of still existing while the protagonist we journeyed with has not.  More on this in a moment.

Note: None of these ideas are original with me except for the term "Halloween Tragedy"

Next, slasher films, for instance, Cabin in the Woods.  (I’d give a spoiler warning, but--let’s face it--if you are reading my blog you’ve either seen Cabin in the Woods or never will, so let’s continue.)

5 annoyingly pretty college students spend their summer break at a cabin that turns out to be….blah blah blah, you get the idea.  The twist is they are being watched by a shadowing pseudo-government cabal, who orchestrates their grisly ends as part of a yearly sacrifice to stop the world from ending.  Two of the teens survive, the sacrifice fails, and the world ends.

The most disturbing interpretation of this piece is the one Jody Foster’s character gives us in the movie itself: the teens are being punished for being young.  This suggests that when we watch characters in slasher films die, we are subconsciously punishing them for not sleeping with us.  Too Freudian for me; I don’t buy it.  It also doesn’t explain haunted houses, unless people are punishing themselves. (Well, there are haunted houses for that, but that’s a whole different thing which I suspect has little to do with the haunted part).

No, you will not get an image to accompany that joke.

I think that the film is a metaphor for slasher films (I hasten to add that this idea is not original to me).  The “sacrifice” (i.e. movie) must go off without a hitch or the world (i.e. the studio) will end.  The 5 teens are the sacrifices.  We, the audience, are the old gods.  Through their deaths, we feel our world will always continue, because like Halloween tragedies, we are still alive at the end.

Does this explain our desire for danger, that is our desire for haunted houses, slasher films, and scary stories?  Is it a desire to cheat death?  Partially, but that cannot fully explain it, or else we would get the same feeling from reading stories of natural disasters in the news.  There is some indefinable spiritual quality to the practice danger of Halloween.  It is more than just surviving.  It is triumph.

My thesis is this: our triumph over danger on earth foreshadows our perpetual triumph in heaven.

The thrill we get from the danger of horror is the desire to face our demons (i.e our sins) and be triumphant.  We don’t enjoy seeing other people fail, we enjoy seeing the scenario in which they fail and imagine ourselves doing differently. 

So no, I don’t think we kill the blond girl off for sleeping with a guy who wasn’t us.  I don’t think we gleefully watch the scientist open the obviously cursed box because he’s smarter than us and we enjoy watching him do something dumb. I think we watch these people die because we want to live forever.  The feeling of triumph horror gives us foreshadows our immortality.  It is a deeply muddied desire, seen through the metaphor of shadow and violence, but it is there.  When the final day comes, and the dark spirit of danger is perfected, we will call her once again by her true name: Nike!  Victory!

Calm down, my neopagan friends.  I'm being metaphorical. For now.  We'll address demons, angels, and gods in another essay.