It was Sunday evening and five-year-old Sally has just returned from her baby-sitter in time to join her parents for the evening meal. It was in this context that Sally commented: “Mommy, why don’t we go to church on Sunday because my baby-sitter goes to church on Sunday?”
- “Out of the mouths of infants and nursing babies you have prepared praise for yourself” (Matthew 21:16).
Perhaps it was Sally’s question that inspired the Holy Father to write a ninety-page Apostolic Letter on the Lord’s Day. In this letter, in observing that the numbers attending Sunday liturgy is strikingly low, the Pope states: “In the minds of many of the faithful, not only the sense of the centrality of the Eucharist but even the sense of the duty to give thanks to the Lord and to pray to him with others in the community of the church seems to be diminishing”.
Among the many things we might do in the Great Jubilee Year when we are being called to a new evangelization – a new appreciation of the Good News – is to ponder anew the meaning of Sunday.
In the liturgical renewal introduced by the Second Vatican Council the centrality of Sunday, the Lord’s Day, is clearly taught. “The church celebrates the paschal mystery on the first day of the week, known as the Lord’s Day or Sunday. This follows a tradition handed down from the apostles, which took its origin from the day of Christ’s resurrection. Thus Sunday should be considered the original first day”(#4).
While Sunday is the only element of the Christian calendar which goes back without interruption to Jesus himself, the Scriptures themselves open and close with the day. The Father begins creative activity in the book of Genesis on the first day of the Jewish week and the sacred writer in the book of Revelation has his vision of the end of all things on that same day of the week, now known as the Lord’s Day.
In Genesis we read, “God blessed the seventh day and made it holy” (2:3). The Sabbath precept, which in the first Covenant prepares for the Sunday of the new and eternal Covenant, is rooted in the depths of God’s plan. Sunday, therefore, is the day of rest because it is “blessed” and “made holy” by God, set apart from the other days to be, among all of them “the Lord’s Day”.
To understand more fully what the Biblical Scripture means by keeping the Sabbath “holy” we need to look at the whole story, which shows how everything, without exception, must be referred back to God. Having sanctified the seventh day with a special blessing and made it God’s own day, will have an important effect on the entire relation of humans with God. What in fact is affirmed is that there exists a dialogue of love between God and humans, which knows of no interruption and is never monotonous.
This dialogue of love involves ordinary as well as more intense means. Consequently all human life must involve praise of and thanksgiving to the Creator. However, people’s relationship with God also demands times of explicit prayer, in which the relationship becomes an intense dialogue, involving every dimension of the person. “The Lord’s Day” is the day of this perfect relationship when men and women raise their song to God and become the voice of all creation.
Flowing from this comes the significance of “the day of rest”. The Lord’s Day returns again and again, interrupting the rhythm of work, to express the dependence of humanity and the cosmos upon God. It recalls that the universe and history belong to God and that without the constant awareness of that truth humanity cannot serve in the world as co-worker of the Creator.
When the Book of Exodus formulates this commandment of the Decalogue it begins by saying, “Remember the Sabbath day in order to keep it holy” (20:8). What is to be remembered is the grand and fundamental work of God in creation, a remembrance which is to inspire and affect the entire religious life of humanity and so fill that day on which people are called to rest. Rest takes on a very sacred value. People are called to rest not only as God rested, but to rest in the Lord, bringing the entire creation to the Lord in praise and thanksgiving.
To be remembered as well is the great work of liberation accomplished by God in the Exodus: “You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with mighty hand and outstretched arm; therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day” (Deuteronomy 5:15).
It is in bringing these two together, creation and salvation, that one can see the full meaning of the Lord’s Day. The interruption of work is not just any kind of interruption, but a celebration of the marvels, which God has worked. Insofar as this “remembering” is alive, full of thanksgiving and praise of God, the human rest on the Lord’s Day takes on its full meaning. When this happens people enter the depth of God’s “rest” and can experience and celebrate God’s joy when God saw that all he had made “was very good” (Genesis 1:31).
It is not difficult for Christians to move from this appreciation of the Lord’s Day as the remembrance of God’s mighty works in creation and salvation to the divine work of the new creation and salvation wrought by God in Christ. God’s saving works are accomplished fully in Jesus. Jesus’ paschal mystery, his dying, rising and outpouring of the Spirit, is the full revelation of the mystery of the world’s origin, the high point of God’s saving work, and the anticipation of the final fulfillment of the world. What God accomplished in creation and brought about for his people in the Exodus has found its fullest expression in Christ’s death and resurrection. This leads us to the conclusion that for us the true Sabbath is the person of our Redeemer, our Lord Jesus Christ.
As the day of resurrection it is the day of new life, a new creation. Because one enters this new life of resurrection through baptism, Sunday is clearly the day of baptism. Following from this is that Sunday foretells life without end, hence renewed the hope of Christians and encouraging them on their journey. It is the supreme day of faith. In the Creed we declare the baptismal and Easter character of Sunday making it a day on which in a special way the baptized renew their adherence to Christ and his Gospel.
Upon reflection the Day of the Lord becomes an indispensable day. The Lord’s Day has structured the history of the church through two thousand years. The identity of this day must be protected and above all it must be lived in all its depth. The celebration of the Christian Sunday remains a indispensable element of our Christian identity.
(The Eucharist, the supreme celebration of Sunday, will be discussed in another message.)
A prayerful pondering of the fullness of the Lord’s Day leads one to realize that it is equally the People’s Day. An early Christian document affirms: “On the first day of the week, you shall all rejoice”. Fasting is set aside and prayers are to be said standing as a sign of resurrection. As that weekly meeting with the risen Lord, Sunday is marked by the joy with which the disciples greeted the Master: “the disciples rejoiced to see the Lord” (John 20:20).
As a day of rest Sunday reveals that the alternation between work and rest has bee built into human nature and willed by God. Rest is sacred. It enables people to withdraw from the often very demanding cycle of earthly tasks to renew awareness that everything is the work of God. For many people work is very oppressive. Sunday ensures everyone the opportunity of enjoying the freedom, rest and relaxation which human dignity requires. It provides the guarantee of at least one day of the week where people can both rest and celebrate religious, family, cultural and interpersonal needs. Withdrawing from work the material things about which we worry give way to spiritual values and we can look anew upon the wonders of creation.
This day of rest gives the faithful an opportunity to carry out works of mercy, charity and the apostolate. To experience the joy of the Risen Lord deep within is to share love with others. A gift is fully a gift when it is given away. “I have told you this that my own joy may be in you and your joy may be complete. This is my commandment: that you love one another as I have loved you” (John 15:11-12).
A common day of rest does more than restore our physical and mental energies. True rest, repose, leisure renews us in our whole being. It puts us at peace with God, with ourselves and with others. This day of rest enables us to stand back from our daily occupation to focus on our highest goals and to follow the call of our conscience with renewed commitment.
As a people day, Sunday is to be a day without the push to achieve, to produce, to be “useful” and efficient. It can be a day of playfulness and simplicity, of contemplation and wonder, of praise and enjoyment of life. Rather than doing different things on Sunday, we should consider “doing” less so as to “be” more.
In short, the Lord’s Day becomes in the truest sense, the “day of people” as well. It is with this belief that we face the Lord’s Day with the words of Nehemiah: “Today is holy to the Lord your God. Do not be sad, and do not weep; for today is holy to our Lord. Do not be saddened this day, for rejoicing in the Lord must be your strength” (Nehemiah 8:9,10).