Which is a better subject for Christian contemplation: Hellfire, or the kind that’s used to burn Bibles?

We got plenty of both this week, courtesy of two religious groups with very different methods but strikingly similar concerns.

The Amazing Grace Baptist Church — and all of its 14 members — announced this week that the congregation is celebrating Halloween by putting torch to unholy words.

Specifically, they’re going “Fahrenheit 451” on any translations of the Bible that were published after the King James Version published in the 17th Century, plus the contemplations of such heretics as Billy Graham and Rick Warren.

Amazing Grace Pastor Marc Grizzard says that religious texts other than the KJV are “Satanic” and “perversions.” I give him an A+ for media baiting and an incomplete on his roundup of popular Christian (or, er, Satanist?) authors. (What? No Corrie ten Boom, no Dee Brestin? Aren’t the ladies traditionally at the forefront when the tinder starts to smoke?)

By coincidence, our religion reporter was working on a story about another church’s Halloween plans on the same day that I heard about the Canton book burnings.

Chuck Griffin, pastor at Crossroads Baptist Church, gave Tiffany Lane a preview of the 12th annual Holy Ghost Hayride that Crossroads puts on in partnership with Fellowship Baptist Church.

Griffin said the church wanted to give families a way to “brag on the Lord,” by offering “something Christian to do at that time of year.”

The hayride is an hourlong race through 6,000 years of Bible stories, wrapping up with scenes from the Book of Revelation that are deemed scary enough that the church offers a drop-off point for small children.

About 100 people serve as actors over the two weekends that it runs. (If you’re curious, it’s at 3300 Rocky River Road from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. Oct. 23, 24, 30 and 31. Tickets are $5; children under 5 get in free.)

But here is my question: Why do we — and by “we,” I mean “Christians” — get ourselves into such a twist over Halloween?

All week, a line from “Hamlet” has been running through my head.

In Act 2, Hamlet ends an argument by noting “there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”

I don’t entirely agree with the sentiment.

I think there is objective good in the world, and obvious evil.

Killing another human being, for example, is wrong. It’s always an act of destruction, and even the noblest motives can, at best, make it an act of evil motivated by kindness. As a Christian, I leave any further judgments on the subject to God.

But can a holiday be objectively “bad”? Is dressing up in costume an affront to God? Or does thinking make it so?

It is a very short step between condemning a practice and condemning those who engage in it.

If Halloween is a “perversion” and “Satanic,” then are those who trick or treat, or pass out candy, Satanic perverts, too?

I assure you, my 10-year-old nephew is the same Jesus-loving boy when he’s running around dressed as a Minuteman that he is when he and his father take communion to shut-ins.

I don’t personally feel a need for an alternative to Halloween.

I think the kids who come to the door are having fun with a harmless tradition. But I applaud Fellowship and Crossroads Baptist churches for offering an alternative activity, something educational and slightly less hilarious than the “judgment house” trend that was making the news a few years back.

(Judgement houses are hilarious because — in striving to evoke terror at the myriad horrors of an unHeavenly afterlife — they actually got back to the roots of the holiday they condemned.)

Yep, I’m for the Holy Ghost Hayride, but there’s something nagging at me. I think it’s the echo of the words of a Bible-burning pastor in Canton.

Fellowship Baptist Pastor Lanny Hasty noted, when Tiffany interviewed him, that Halloween has “some Satanic background.”

You guys want to scare me?

OK, you’ve got it: I’m a little freaked out that two very different Christian churches have tossed out accusations of Satan-worship in the same week.

To which I say: Boo.

• Betsy O’Donovan can be reached at bodonovan@theej.com.