Joan Chittister, in her daily commentary on the rule of Benedict, shares the following thoughts on the importance of Sunday and Sunday Worship in the life of the Christian community:
It is a day full of tradition and rhythm and rememberings of the simple but important concepts of existence. It is a return to basic truths that are never to be sacrificed for variety and always reinforced through repetition [The Rule of Benedict - insight for the ages; pg 80].
Joan makes these comments in the light of Western culture where "The idea of sabbaths that are fixed and solemn is for most part gone ..." replaced by "... Sundays ... spent in hectic activity designed to make us relax by drowning out the pressures of the rest of the week with the inane uselessness of the weekends" [ibid.]. She compares this with the Benedictine spirituality, where:
... the sabbath is the moment for returning to the surety and solemnity of life, for setting our sights above the daily, for restating the basics, for giving meaning to the rest of the week so that the mundane and the immediate do not become the level of our existence [ibid.].
Rennie D
25 June 2008
No comments:
Post a Comment