Keep Holy the Sabbath?

DublinWriter

While driving down to Lidl tonight I noticed the large amount of cars parked around the local church.

Although I'm not a Christian, I was wondering what is the whole deal with people getting mass on a Saturday night?

a) Why do they do it? Are they trying to keep their Sunday free?
b) What is the official Vatican line on this?
c) Surely it goes against the third commandment "Keep Holy the Sabbath"?...that's unless you are observing the Jewish Sabbath (Moses and Christ both died Jews after all!).

..or would that be an Ecumenical matter?!?

Manach

For Saturday Evening Mass, it is I believe because techincally the Sabbath runs from the 24 hour period evening to evening. I don't think that the actual day of the week to be the Sabbath is mentioned in the Bible

robindch

> the actual day of the week to be the Sabbath is mentioned in the Bible

Er, the Sabbath is Saturday. Still is in most european languages (see here) + Russian (pronounced sa-BOW-toe)...

UU

Actually the Sabbath or Shabbat(in Hebrew) is originally the Jewish day of rest in which it's dedicated to prayer. It runs from Friday sunset to Saturday sunset. On the Friday all the food and cleaning is done and at sunset the family pray together and have dinner. On the Saturday morning, the family go to the synagogue for service and no work is done for the rest of the day.

In the Christian tradition the day starts in the morning and ends at night. There are a number of reasons why mass is on a Sunday. My religion teacher once told me that it is on a Sunday instead of the latter Saturday because Christ resurrected on the Sunday. The Christian mass on Saturday evening is only really in the Catholic tradition, probably reminiscent to the original Jewish custom, while most Protestant faiths have service only on Sunday morning.

I can't tell you what the official Vatican line on this is as I'm not Catholic but it should be on the internet somewhere. Also, the in Jewish Torah (Old Testament) it says that God created the world in six days and on the last day he rested (the Saturday) hense the Sabbath being a day of rest and Sunday being known as the first day of the week. From a Jewish point of view, Christians not observing the Sabbath on a Saturday is going against the third commandment but it is widely accepted to be on a Sunday in the Christian tradition.

Manach

Well, the traditonal day of rest and reflection for a family/community gathering seems to be more a pasting custom. In the book "Willing Slaves" by Madeleine Bunting, the author shows that the changes Sunday trading decouple the collective time to that of individuals deciding their own (if any) rest periods.

Flukey

The Saturday evening mass being used for Sunday is a relatively modern thing. It was originally introduced to facilitate those who could not go on a Sunday, say people who were working, or travelling or going into surgery etc. Unfortunately it is used for people who no longer go on a Sunday, preferring a lie-in after a Saturday night out, or a chance to relax and read the Sunday papers or whatever. For me, I still go on the Sunday and though I have often been a Saturday evening mass, I would not feel that I have met my obligation so I would go on the Sunday too.

As to which day the Sabbath is and is Sunday the seventh day of the week, well the answer is in the Bible. Sunday is the first day of the week. That is what it says right from the beginning. Oh, and before you go telling me that God rested on the seventh day, the sabbath, and that that is Sunday, think about it.

The Jewish sabbath has always been and still is Saturday, the seventh day. Fast forward to the New Testament, specifically to the crucifixion. As we all know, Christ was crucified on Friday. It is described as being "the day of preparation, the day before the Sabbath." He was taken down off the cross and laid in the tomb on that day. They did not want him to be still on the cross on the Sabbath. He lay in the tomb on Friday and Saturday, it being the Sabbath. That is why he didn't rise that day. It was the day of rest. It was on the morning of the third day, Sunday, described in the Gospels as being the first day of the week that the women came to the tomb, to find Jesus had risen.

So from Genesis through to the gospels of the 4 evangelists, Saturday was always the seventh day, the Sabbath. It still is the Jewish Sabbath as I said. Christians however, later adopted Sunday as their Sabbath, to honour the fact that Christ rose that day, and that is the whole basis of Christianity, but it is still the first day of the week. It is why we have a two day weekend, with the week ending right in the middle of it. Think also of the Sunday being named after the sun and think of the "let their be light" quote in the Old Testament, signifying the first days work. The Sun is the most important thing to the planet and why it is given the highest precedence and has the first day named after it. Monday, is then named after the moon, a less significant object, the second most prominent in our skies.

So yes, Sunday is the first day of the week, making Saturday the seventh day. Open up Microsoft Excel if you have it. Other spreadsheet products may suffice. Anyway, type today's date into a cell, say A1. Then in any other cell type:
=Weekday(A1)
You will get a number between 1 and 7, indicating the day of the week. As I type it is now Sunday, so you will get 1. If it is another day when you see this, like Monday, you'll get 2, Tuesday 3 and so on. Assuming your PC is set with today's date you could also type:
=Weekday(today())
You will get the same result. If you don't know what day of the week you were born on, you can use the Weekday function to find out. Do the same thing. Type your date of birth into one cell and use the Weekday function with that cell reference and it will tell you. You can also type your date of birth, or any date, enclosed in double quotes, inside the Weekday function and get the day on which that date occured:
=Weekday("10/10/2000")

So the Jewish and Christian God are in line with Bill Gates, who thinks he is God. That Sunday is the seventh day and Monday is the first day is a common misconception. For the Jews, Saturday, the seventh day, is the Sabbath and for Christians the Sabbath is Sunday, the first day of the week.

Excelsior

Great post Flukey. Really nicely answered the original poster. I'd never thought of it that way.