The Sabbath is dedicated family time. We sit around the table, sing a song of praise to the “woman of worth”, bless our children and extend hospitality to others. We go to the synagogue and renew the bonds of community and friendship. We study our sacred texts and reorient ourselves in the light of their timeless values. We pray, thanking God for what we have instead of envying others for what they have. It is when we rediscover the real roots of happiness.

That is what the Sabbath was at its best, whether on Saturday or Sunday. It was a collective statement of values that said there are limits to our striving. There are things you can buy, but there are others, no less valuable, that we can only make for ourselves: relationships of love and generosity, a feeling for the rhythms and adagios of time, a sense of the spectacular beauty of the created world that we fully experience only when we stop and inhale the fragrance of things.

Because of that, British culture once had an inner poise and balance. Families had time to eat a meal together, to converse and share, not sit watching a screen at one remove from reality. The Sabbath was a day on which money did not matter, when we each had equal dignity whatever we earned or could afford. It was to time what a public park is to space: something we can all enjoy on equal terms. On the good days, it made us glad to be alive, singing, with Gerard Manley Hopkins, “Glory be to God for dappled things”.

Read it all.

Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Religion & Culture • * Economics, Politics • Economy • Consumer/consumer spending • * International News & Commentary • England / UK • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Faiths • Judaism

1. libraryjim wrote: He missed on one point: Sunday was never declared the ‘Sabbath’ by the Christian Church. It was always declared “The Lord’s Day”, and noted as separate from the Sabbath of the Hebrews. “By a tradition handed down from the apostles which took its origin from the very day of Christ’s Resurrection, the Church celebrates the Paschal mystery every seventh day, which day is appropriately called the Lord’s Day or Sunday.” The day of Christ’s Resurrection is both the first day of the week, the memorial of the first day of creation, and the “eighth day,” on which Christ after his “rest” on the great sabbath inaugurates the “day the Lord has made,” the “day that knows no evening.” The Lord’s Supper is its center, for there the whole community of the faithful encounters the risen Lord who invites them to his banquet” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, #1166). I could quote other sources, but suffice it to say that the Early Church designated the first day of the week as the day of meeting for the breaking bread, the apostles’ teaching and prayers.  The Sabbath was the Jewish day of worship, and the early Jewish believers continued to attend synagogue on Sabbath until prohibited by the Jewish leaders and later by Christian council decisions. April 26, 8:38 pm | [comment link]

Registered members must log in to comment.