This is the Sunday before Halloween and All Saints Day, two holidays that need to be seen together if they are to make much sense to the person in the pew or on their knees. Halloween began as a Celtic holiday which was an eve to chase off the evil spirits and later adopted by the Christians in Europe. People would build large bond fires, wear masks and costumes made of animal skins to ward off the evil one. After Pope Benedict IV declared the following day All Saints Day in which the lives of martyrs, dead saints and other dead persons were to be celebrated, the two holidays became combined in the United States. We still dress in costumes and try our hand at getting treats on All Hallows Eve, Halloween. Young people dress as their favorite character, dead, alive or imaginary. I suppose some may project a hoped for realization of a characteristic of their chosen dress alike, but mostly it is just a fun evening of collecting candy. We no longer frighten off evil spirits and goblins. The holiday has become domesticated taken over by the candy industry. I sometimes wonder if we don't need to be more cognizant of the evils which bedevil us even if they are largely of our own making. Would that not give us a clearer way to celebrate the day of those saints that have gone before us? I think of the saints in my own family, far from perfect, but saints nonetheless. It might be helpful to remember the evils the night before. Run them off. Celebrate the lives of the dead the next morning. That would do wonderful for my psyche. I think I'll try it on for size on the 31st of October and 1st of November. I won't build bonfires and I'm a little old for trick-o-treating, but I'm able to name the evils of my own making and some of those done to me. Naming them should conquer them and clear the way for a celebration of the lives the saints who have gone before me. How about you? Being Wonder Woman might just work for a worn out model as well a young girl.                 -Ann Drake