When the people became Christians, the early church fathers let them keep the old feast of Samhain, who was the wicked Lord of Death, but kept it in honor of all the saints. The eve of the festival of fun and celebrations came to be called Halloween. The name comes from the old English word "halwe" or holy.

The Feast of All Saints comes on November 1. The eve is on October 31. Bonfires were lighted in ancient Halloween celebrations.

So two dates were combined into the calendar. That's how many old festivals were kept whose dates became remembrance dates.

Mommy's learned more about all the symbols and saints and their emblems, also, and miracles, too, since one day she found a drawing I made of "Princess Sabra," and turned over the page to see "St. George and the Orange Tree."

She began to use her thoughts not only about symbols, but her imagination and her foresight too. Looking ahead!

She wondered if the orange tree was a remembrance of the orange groves that I saw in California. She went on to learn about the saints and their miracles and their lives.

Mommy has been following the instructions to go back and look up the history of the Church, because she never stops trying to learn it all. Being with children a lot helps her to see how God wants us to think. We have to think in symbols too. Everything around us is a symbol. The things we see all mean something much more real than our eyes tell us.

God is everywhere. He is in the trees and in the oak trees, symbols of power and strength and eternity. He is in the birds, symbols of the soul. He is in the Squirrels, scratching away for the fruits and acorns. They are symbols of forethought, knowing ahead the things for God. They are symbols of spiritual striving, always being busy to go higher to God. They are symbols, when they sit and watch and wait, of meditation of God's Divine Word, and all His things of earth, part of Him.

All the while we pray, we are remembering the days before Jesus died, and the day that He arose from the grave. That is really Easter.

One short period of a week and a day is Holy Week and Easter. The Sunday before Easter is called Palm Sunday, when Jesus rode back into Jerusalem after he had finished teaching in the smaller cities and village of Palestine. He came back in triumph, but riding on the lowly donkey.

Palms were waved before Him and Hosannas were shouted. Hosanna means "Save, I pray!" On this day we are told "Thy King Cometh unto Thee."

There are Holy Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday. Then there is Holy Thursday, Maundy Thursday, the Lord's Last Supper. This was not the main Passover meal but the evening after the First Day of Unleavened Bread, for the Passover meal was eaten at sunset on the next day, Friday. The Paschal Lamb was slain at 3:00 p.m. on Friday afternoon. Christ died at 3:00 p.m., the same time, so that the crucifixion took place on the Day of Preparation, or Parasceve, when the lamb was slain but not eaten until after sunset. This is the Second Great Passover freeing the human race, through the offering of God's own sacrifice, His Beloved Son.

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