A COUPLE of years ago, at about 11pm, I was on my way home from a livery company dinner in the City of London on October 31, Halloween. It was a cold night and so I was wearing my full length black clerical cloak. That cloak keeps all the cold out. I have worn it countless times to conduct winter funerals in icy Yorkshire churchyards.

As I walked along Newgate Street towards Christ’s Church Greyfriars, two well-dressed City ladies in their twenties saw me and screamed. I thought it a reflection on the times we live in: when modern City girls see a man in a clerical cloak, they don’t think “parish priest” – they think “Dracula”.

Halloween, according to some ancient traditions, is an evil night when the ghosts and demons are allowed to flap about and try to scare us stiff. But the meaning of the word is “All Hallows Eve.” And those who are hallowed – that is made holy – are the Christian saints. All Hallows Eve, Halloween, then is the Eve of All Saints. And of course the following day, today, November 1, is All Saints Day. It is a day when many will attend church and celebrate the saints, those “lights of the world in their several generations”. I always enjoy singing the wonderful hymn, to the magnificently rousing tune by Vaughan Williams: “For all the saints who from their labours rest/who thee by faith before the world confessed thy name O Jesus, be forever blessed. Alleluia.”

Isn’t there more to celebrate in this than Halloween, the festival of darkness? I know for a surety that children know a damn (so to speak) more about Halloween than they know about the saints. There is something perverse about the celebration of darkness rather than light. According to one depressing tradition, Halloween derives from the ancient Festival of the Dead, Parentalia. Or it might come down to us from another old custom, that of Samhain when – the Irish, Scots and Welsh in particular – sought supernatural encounters with the dead. All very unwholesome, if you ask me.

On the other hand there are happier customs and beliefs associated with Halloween.

For example, the tradition of putting candles in turnips or pumpkins was said to represent the prayers of Christians for souls in Purgatory.

But how many of our secular superstitious believe in Purgatory these days? Not as many as believe in the reality of Harry Potter and Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, I’ll bet.

Most of us are prepared to put up with a spot of nonsense if it creates a bit of fun, but the trouble arises when we find this nonsense has its truly nasty side.

Unfortunately, Halloween has this side to it in its present practice of Trick or Treat.

Children hammer on doors and demand a treat from the householder – usually it’s money they’re after – and, if they don’t get it, they will play some cruel trick on the occupant.

I’ve come across fireworks being shoved through letterboxes. It amounts to blackmail.

I don’t really mind Halloween, so long as it is celebrated in a spirit of fun and not made an excuse for cruelty and for frightening people.

Actually if you really want to celebrate the Day of the Dead, tomorrow, November 2, is the time to do it. This is called All Souls’ Day when we are called to remember in our prayers (or, if we don’t pray, at least in our thoughts) those of our relations and friends who have died.