Just in time for Halloween, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has announced the publication of “Prayers Against the Powers of Darkness,” drawn from the Church’s manual on exorcism.
The Vatican has published new guidelines regarding Catholic burial and cremation just in time for Halloween and the beginning of November—the “month of the dead.”
On Sunday afternoon, Pope Francis traveled to Rome’s largest cemetery to celebrate Mass and pray for the “faithful departed,” an ancient Christian custom associated principally with All Saints Day (Nov 1) and All Souls Day (Nov 2).
In his Angelus message on the Christian feast of All Saints, the Pope said to the large crowd assembled in the sunny Saint Peter’s Square: “we experience in a particularly vivid way the reality of the communion of saints, our extended family, made up of all members of the Church, both those who are still pilgrims on earth, and those—immensely more—who have already departed for heaven.”
A growing trend among Christian families is dressing children as saints for Halloween, rather than as ghouls or witches, to take back the celebration of the “Hallowed Eve” of the Feast of all Saints.
