One Halloween, Dave Denny and I dressed as a mime act we called “Madre and the Clown”!

In our October 2023 podcast, “Humor and Halloween,” Dave Denny and I talk about two of my favorite topics. Do you enjoy celebrating Halloween with friends and family? Or do you think it’s silly, maybe even dangerous? What happens if we take a deeper look at Halloween? At its Druidic roots and the Celtic Festival of Samhain, meaning “summer’s end” and pronounced “sah-ween.” What did our Puritan ancestors think of Halloween? And how did the arrival of the Irish in America after the potato famine in 1848 change that? Why do we carve jack-o’-lanterns and dress up in costumes?

“Everyone needs a little bit of madness,” said Zorba the Greek, an old hero of ours. “Otherwise, we’ll never cut the rope and be free.” What does “madness” have to do with us? Why is humor more important than ever in these troubled times? Who was St. Philip Neri and what does he have to teach us today about living a joyful life? What kind of trickster was he? And what is the meaning of that crazy photo of a pompous cardinal’s red hat on top of a soccer ball?