Audio only:
Can you do physical labor on Sunday? Can you go shopping? How about buying gas?
In this episode, Jimmy Akin looks at the Bible’s teaching on Sunday and what the Church’s law does—and doesn’t—allow to be done on this day.
TRANSCRIPT:
Coming Up
Back when I lived in California, I would often go to Jiffy Lube—an oil change place—on Sunday mornings. I’d go to early Mass, just like I did every week, and then—when my car needed an oil change—I’d stop by Jiffy Lube afterwards.
It was very convenient. Early Sunday morning, I was usually the first customer and didn’t have to wait.
But then I moved back to my hometown in Arkansas, and found things were different.
The local Jiffy Lubes weren’t open on Sunday morning.
When I discovered that, I couldn’t have been more pleased!
Let’s get into it!
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Howdy, folks!
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Questions About Sunday
A lot of people have questions about what they can and can’t do on Sundays—and other holy days of obligation.
Is it okay to work? What kind of work can you do?
Can you mow your lawn?
Is it okay to go shopping?
How about going out to a restaurant?
I get a lot of questions like this, and so I thought I’d do a video to answer them.
The Jewish Sabbath
The starting point for understanding the principles behind the Christian celebration of Sunday is the Jewish sabbath that preceded it.
In the Ten Commandments, we read:
Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and made it holy (Exodus 20:8-11).
Now, because of its place in the Ten Commandments, some later Jews took this command in an overly strict sense, and by the time of the first century, this was definitely the case.
We thus read of multiple instances in the Gospels where Jesus’ opponents criticized him for doing things like healing on the sabbath, which prompted Jesus to point out that they were placing what they understood to be the requirements of the sabbath above human needs. For Jesus, taking care of human needs was what was ultimately important, and in Luke 14, we read about how Jesus healed a man with dropsy—also known as edema or swelling—on the sabbath:
Jesus responded to the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, “Is it lawful to heal on the sabbath, or not?” But they remained silent. Then he took him and healed him and sent him away. And he said to them, “Which of you, having a son or an ox that has fallen into a well on a sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out?” And they could not reply to these things (Luke 14:3-6).
The answer to Jesus’ question of who wouldn’t pull a son or an ox out of a well on the sabbath was “nobody.” All of Jesus’ hearers would have pulled their son or their ox out of a well on the sabbath. That’s why nobody could answer him. They didn’t want to admit that they—themselves—would take care of human and animal needs on the sabbath, because if they did admit that then they would have to admit that Jesus was right to take care of human needs by healing people on the sabbath.
In another passage—in Mark 2—Jesus’ opponents have been criticizing him for letting his disciples pluck grain on the sabbath to satisfy their human need of hunger, and on this occasion Jesus tells them:
The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath.
So the Son of Man is lord even of the sabbath (Mark 2:27-28).
This establishes two important principles. The first is that the sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath.
This principle helps us get our priorities straight. Man was not made for the sabbath, which means that the sabbath doesn’t take priority over man. You don’t have to bend human nature and human needs to fit the supposed requirements of the sabbath.
Instead, the sabbath was made for man—to help man—and so if there’s a conflict between human needs and the sabbath, it’s the sabbath that needs to bend, not man.
From this first principle, Jesus derives the second—that the Son of Man is lord even of the sabbath.
In other words, as the Son of Man, Jesus has the authority of a lord over the sabbath. That is, he gets to make or abolish rules for it, and he’s already indicated what his priority is—it’s taking care of human needs.
So this is an important principle each one of us should remember. We shouldn’t be getting scrupulous about what it’s okay to do or not do on Sundays. Jesus is the lord of the day, he says that it was made for us—not the other way around—and so if doing something takes care of a legitimate human need, it can be done on Sunday. You don’t have to go to great lengths to avoid doing things on Sunday that you need to do. We’re not supposed to be scrupulous about this.
We also need to remember that Jesus shared his authority with the disciples. Thus in Matthew 18, we read:
Truly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven (Matthew 18:18).
Binding and loosing refers to the ability to establish and abolish laws for the community, so Jesus gave the Church the authority to regulate the way that days like Sunday are to be observed, which will be important in our discussion going forward.
Sabbath and Sunday
One of the things it’s important to know is that the Jewish sabbath is not the same thing as the Christian celebration of Sunday. They involve related principles, but Sunday is not the Christian sabbath. The sabbath has not been moved. It is and always has been Saturday, and it was binding on the Jewish people prior to the time of Christ, but Sunday is not the same thing.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church states:
The sabbath, which represented the completion of the first creation, has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the resurrection of Christ (CCC 2190).
This shift can be a bit confusing given the presence of the sabbath in the Ten Commandments, which is also called the decalogue or “ten words.” Many people have the idea that the Ten Commandments are unalterable and binding on everyone, and that’s true when it comes to most of them, but not when it comes to the sabbath command.
The Catechism of the Council of Trent explains:
The other commandments of the decalogue are precepts of the natural and perpetual law, under all circumstances unalterable, whence, notwithstanding the abrogation of the law of Moses, all the commandments contained in the two tables are observed by the Christian people, not because Moses so commanded, but because they agree with the law of nature, by the dictates of which men are impelled to their observance; whereas this commandment, touching the sanctification of the sabbath, if considered as to the time of its observance, is not fixed and unalterable, but susceptible of change, and belongs not to the moral but ceremonial law. Neither is it a natural principle, for we are not taught or formed by nature to give external worship to God on the sabbath rather than on any other day; but from the time the people of Israel were liberated from the bondage of Pharaoh, they observed the sabbath day (Catechism of Trent 3:4:3).
So natural law doesn’t require that we give worship to God on one particular day rather than another. As a result, even the Israelites didn’t observe this day until they came out of Egypt during the Exodus. Consequently, we’re not obliged to observe the sabbath.
Instead, we’re obliged to honor the moral principles that lie underneath the observance of the sabbath. The Catechism of Trent continues:
The worship of God and the practice of religion, which are comprised in this precept, have the natural law for their basis, whereas it is natural for us to give some time to the worship of God; a proof of which is the fact, that we find amongst all nations certain regular and public festivals consecrated to the performance of the rites and solemnities of religion. For it is natural to man to give some time to necessary functions, such as bodily repose, sleep, and other such matters; so also does the same nature require that some time be allowed to the mind, to recruit its energies in the contemplation of God; and thus, as some portion of time ought to be consecrated to divine things, and to paying the worship due to the Deity, this no doubt appertains to the moral law.
The apostles, therefore, resolved to consecrate the first day of the seven to divine worship and called it the Lord’s day (Catechism of Trent 3:4:6-7).
So the apostles consecrated Sunday as the Lord’s day, and that’s what Christians are celebrating. It isn’t the same thing as the Jewish sabbath, but a parallel celebration based on the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
When it comes to what is to be done or avoided on this day, the Catechism of Trent focuses not on the external behaviors themselves but on the principle that underlies them. After quoting the words from the Bible that says you, your family, and your servants are to have the day off, it says:
In these words we are taught, in the first place, to avoid altogether whatsoever may interfere with the divine worship. For it is easy to perceive that every manner of servile work is forbidden, not because it is improper or evil of its ownself, but because it withdraws our mind from the divine worship, which is the end of the commandment (Catechism of Trent 3:4:21).
This passage refers to a concept known as servile work, which we’ll come back to.
But the important thing to note is that servile work isn’t forbidden for its own sake. It’s not an evil. Instead, the Catechism says that servile work withdraws the mind from the worship of God, which is what the Sunday celebration is all about.
So the reason that servile work was to be avoided on Sunday was not that it was a bad thing but that it interfered with divine worship. It’s the underlying principle that is important.
What Is Servile Work?
When they encounter older texts like this, a lot of people wonder what servile work is.
This isn’t surprising since servile work is not a phrase that we use today, so a lot of people won’t be familiar with it.
It’s also a phrase that isn’t used in the Church’s current laws regarding Sundays, as we’ll see. That’s why you won’t encounter the phrase in current Church documents.
However, we can clear up what it is fairly easily.
The term servile comes from the Latin word servus, which means slave, servant, or serf. So servile work is the kind of work that a slave, a servant, or a serf does. This was understood to be physical labor—in contrast to mental labors.
For example, the section on the Third Commandment in the Catechism of St. Pius X states:
6 Q. What does the Third Commandment forbid?
A. The Third Commandment forbids servile works and any other works that hinder the worship of God.
7 Q. What servile works are forbidden on festivals?
A. The servile works forbidden on festivals are those works called manual, that is, those material works in which the body has more part than the mind, such, for instance, as are ordinarily done by servants, laborers, and artisans.
Similarly, the Explanation of the Baltimore Catechism say this:
359 Q. What are servile works?
- Servile works are those which require labor rather of body than of mind. “Servile”—that is, work which was formerly done by the slaves. Therefore, writing, reading, studying, etc., are not servile, because they were not the works of slaves.
Now, even at the time it was recognized that there were situations in which you could do physical labor on a Sunday. The Explanation of the Baltimore Catechism continues:
360 Q. Are servile works on Sunday ever lawful?
- Servile works are lawful on Sunday when the honor of God, the good of our neighbor, or necessity requires them.
“Honor of God”—for example, erecting an altar that could not be erected at another time, so that the people may hear Mass on that day.
“Good of our neighbor”—such as reconstructing a broken bridge that must be used every day; or clearing away obstacles after a railroad accident, that trains may not be delayed.
“Necessity”—firemen endeavoring to extinguish a fire, sailors working on a ship at sea, etc.
So—in keeping with Jesus’ principle that human needs took priority over the strict observance of the sabbath—such needs could justify the performance of physical labor on Sundays.
What the Law Said/Says
This brings us to what canon law has to say about activity on Sundays and other holy days of obligation.
Canon law is the legal system that is binding on Catholics. It is based on the power of binding and loosing that Christ gave to his Church, and—in addition to the various laws that have been created and modified over the last 2000 years—it has been codified or placed into a single book just two times in the Latin Church.
The first codification happened in 1917, with the release of the 1917 Code of Canon Law. According to canon 1248 of the 1917 Code:
Canon 1248 (1917 Code of Canon Law)
On feast days of precept, Mass is to be heard; there is an abstinence from servile work, legal acts, and likewise, unless there is a special indult or legitimate customs provide otherwise, from public trade, shopping, and other public buying and selling.
Feast days of precept refers to what we would call a holy day of obligation and would include Sundays.
This canon establishes both a positive requirement—something that is to be done on such days—and a set of negative requirements—that is, things that are not to be done.
The positive requirement—the thing you were supposed to do—was to hear Mass said—and there were several negative requirements or things to be avoided.
The first of these was servile work—that is, the physical labor that servants typically did.
Also to be avoided was placing legal acts—legal acts being a form of intellectual labor that also was thought to distract from the worship of God. Nothing more boring than going through the fine print of contracts and laws and things like that.
The final thing that was to be avoided basically amounted to engaging in commerce. Public trade, shopping, and other public buying and selling were listed as not to be performed “unless there is a special indult or legitimate customs provide otherwise.” So it was recognized that this was not an absolute prohibition. Church authorities could and did grant indults and allow for legitimate customs involving buying and selling on Sundays and holy days.
Now, that was the law as it stood in 1917, but the 20th century saw a lot of change, and work began on a revised Code of Canon Law. The new version was finally released in 1983, and the law on this point was substantially revised.
One of the things the drafters took into account was the enormous number of different circumstances that Catholics find themselves in across the world. Whole categories of jobs existed in 1983 that were unknown in 1917—like computer programmers, for example—and all kinds of people were doing different sorts of labor than had been the case in preceding decades. In 1917, most people did manual labor in farms or factories during the week, and so taking a break from servile labor on Sundays made sense.
But by 1983, people who did physical work like on a farm or factory were a much lower percent of society, with many, many more people doing intellectual rather than servile labor during the week, so telling them not to do servile labor on Sundays wouldn’t really give them a break from what they were ordinarily doing.
As a result, it was decided to retire the concept of servile labor from the law and instead re-focus the law on the underlying principles that would be true regardless of what the job by which you earn a living happened to be.
Canon 1247 of the 1983 Code of Canon Law thus states:
Canon 1247 (1983 Code of Canon Law)
On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are obliged to participate in the Mass. Moreover, they are to abstain from those works and affairs which hinder the worship to be rendered to God, the joy proper to the Lord’s day, or the suitable relaxation of mind and body.
Like the canon in the previous Code, this one also had a positive requirement of what to do and several negative requirements of what not to do.
The positive requirement was the same—to participate in the Mass—while the negative requirements were completely restructured. Instead of focusing on specific types of action—like physical labor, placing legal acts, and engaging in commerce—the new canon spells out the goals that we’re supposed to be pursuing on Sunday and prohibits anything that would conflict with these goals.
Thus it says that we are to avoid “works and affairs which hinder” one of three things, which are the goals to be achieved on Sundays and holy days. The first goal is the worship to be rendered to God on such days. The second is the joy that it is appropriate to have on the Lord’s day. And the third goal is the suitable relaxation of both mind and body.
So you can do anything—absolutely anything—on a Sunday or holy day—as long as it doesn’t conflict with one of those goals.
Adapting to Your Circumstances
This means that the law adapts to whatever circumstances you find yourself in.
For example, let’s suppose that you do physical work all week. Maybe you’re a farmer or a construction worker. You work your body hard every day, and you don’t get a lot of breaks. Well, Sunday is your day to rest physically. Continuing to work hard on Sundays would hinder “the suitable relaxation . . . of body,” and so—everything being equal—you want to chill out on Sundays and have a chance to physically recuperate.
On the other hand, you might want to do something intellectual on Sundays to get some mental stimulation and thus promote “the suitable relaxation of mind.” Maybe you want to take a class and learn something new. Or maybe you want to start writing a book. Or maybe you want to play a musical instrument. Whatever will help you stimulate and relax your mind is fine.
But now let’s suppose that you’re an information worker—like me. You spend all week pulling in and pushing out data and squeezing your brain hard. Well, come Sunday, you want to get out of the intellectual groove you’ve been in all week and do something different. For you, “the suitable relaxation of mind” means not participating in the same intellectual grind that you do every day.
In my own case, I work with faith-related information six days a week. I’m constantly studying the Bible and Church documents, and so when Sunday arrives, I should do something else—not more Bible study and Church documents. So I might read fiction for a change, or watch a movie, or binge a TV show that I like. Something that gets me out of the study-teach, study-teach groove I’m normally in.
Even better, I might up my physical activity—to get some exercise and thus help with “the suitable relaxation . . . of body.” I might do home improvement projects, or gardening, or mow my lawn, or go dancing, or play sports and get the kind of physical stimulation that I lack every other day of the week.
For someone who does intellectual labor to earn a living, all of these would be good alternatives in principle, but there’s another factor to be considered, which is personal preference.
You see, I hate mowing my lawn. Some people may like mowing. It gets them outdoors, gets them some exercise, and gives them a sense of accomplishment. For people like that, mowing on a Sunday might be just the thing. But that’s not me. For me, mowing my lawn would be just as much a chore on Sunday as it would any other day of the week. As a result—for me—mowing my lawn on Sunday would interfere with “the joy proper to the Lord’s day” because I would hate it.
So I—like everybody else—should try to find things to do on Sunday that I actually enjoy. These should be different than what I do day-in-and-day-out so that I’m not stuck in the same groove I’m in the rest of the week, and—if possible—they should be things I find fun, things I enjoy, so that I have extra joy on the Lord’s day.
But the key thing to be aware of is that the law now adapts to your particular circumstances. We’re no longer in a situation in which 95% of the population works on a farm and we all do manual labor six days a week. People are living in just too many different kinds of situations for a one-size-fits-all list of rules that fits everybody or almost everybody, and that’s why the law now focuses on the goals to be achieved on Sundays rather than specific practices, so it adapts to whatever circumstances you find yourself in.
Sunday Responsibilities
Of course, we also have responsibilities on Sundays and holy days. Remember how Jesus noted that—even in his own, Jewish society—people who had a son or an ox fall into a pit on the sabbath would immediately pull it out.
Well, they had to do other things on the sabbath, too. They were living in a society where 95% of people worked on farms, and one thing that’s true about cows and sheep and goats is that they still get hungry on the sabbath and have to be fed. So—even on the sabbath—you still had to make sure they got fed.
What’s more, if you had dairy animals, you had to make sure they got milked. You can’t let a dairy cow, sheep, or goat go without being milked for too long or it will cause the milk to build up in painful ways inside the animals, potentially leading to inflammation, infections, bruising, injuries, and serious conditions like mastitis.
So you had to make sure the animals got fed and got milked, even on the sabbath. Jewish farmers had to do chores even on the sabbath, and Christian farmers have had to do chores even on Sundays.
There’s no escaping our responsibilities, and so we shouldn’t expect Sundays to be nothing but fun days. We’re going to have to do some things we’d prefer not to. Thus the Catechism of the Catholic Church says:
Family needs or important social service can legitimately excuse from the obligation of Sunday rest. The faithful should see to it that legitimate excuses do not lead to habits prejudicial to religion, family life, and health.
The charity of truth seeks holy leisure; the necessity of charity accepts just work (CCC 2185).
Meaning work that is just or right.
So there’s a balance to be had between leisure and responsibility, and you can take care of your family needs on Sunday. They do “legitimately excuse from the obligation of Sunday rest.”
We should see to it that we don’t let legitimate excuses lead to habits that are harmful to our religion, family life, or health, but that doesn’t mean we don’t help people with their human needs. Just like Jesus healed people on the sabbath. The Catechism says that:
Sunday is traditionally consecrated by Christian piety to good works and humble service of the sick, the infirm, and the elderly (CCC 2186).
Given how busy our lives are, it can also be difficult to find the time to do some of the things we need to do on other days of the week. The Catechism acknowledges that—and that it’s okay to do them on Sundays. It says:
Christians will also sanctify Sunday by devoting time and care to their families and relatives, often difficult to do on other days of the week (CCC 2186).
So it’s okay to do some things for your family that are hard to do at other times during the week, like laundry or whatever. Once again, the principle is: The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath.
A Common Celebration
When I first moved back to Arkansas, I found that the Jiffy Lubes were closed on Sundays. That’s because people in Arkansas have more of a common celebration of Sundays than people in California do. There are lots of businesses here that are closed on Sundays, and I think that’s great!
Is it less convenient than it is in California, where basically every business is open every day? Yeah, but there are other benefits that having a common celebration of Sundays promotes.
Not only does it make it easier for people to go to church, but—even for those who don’t go to church—it provides a common day of rest. It makes it easier for people to take time off, and it affects the rhythm of the life of the community, providing a communal pause and time to do something else.
This is something that the Catechism endorses. It says:
In respecting religious liberty and the common good of all, Christians should seek recognition of Sundays and the Church’s holy days as legal holidays. They [that is, the Christians] have to give everyone a public example of prayer, respect, and joy and defend their traditions as a precious contribution to the spiritual life of society (CCC 2188).
The Catechism also says:
Sanctifying Sundays and holy days requires a common effort. Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord’s Day (CCC 2187).
So we should make a common effort to have Sundays as legal holidays, but there’s a balance to be struck here, and the Catechism discusses that balance.
Those Who Work on Sundays
Some people get scrupulous about asking others to work on Sundays, and that’s a problem.
I get questions from people who wonder if it’s okay for them to go to the supermarket or the gas station on Sunday. Some of them are afraid to do so. I even get the sense that some are a little prideful about it. “I’m not going to ask someone else to work on Sunday!”
Well, the Catechism acknowledges that we should work to have Sunday be legal holiday, but it also acknowledges that there are legitimate limits to how extensive a holiday it should be. Remember, the sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath, and it’s all about meeting human needs, and it’s okay for some people to work to meet those needs.
Thus the Catechism says:
Traditional activities (sport, restaurants, etc.), and social necessities (public services, etc.), require some people to work on Sundays, but everyone should still take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure. . . . In spite of economic constraints, public authorities should ensure citizens a time intended for rest and divine worship. Employers have a similar obligation toward their employees (CCC 2187).
So traditional activities like sports and restaurants are okay on Sundays. It’s okay to go to the sports game and okay to go to a restaurant on Sundays, even if that means some people work.
Sports correspond to the human need for rest and recreation, and restaurants correspond to the human need for food—which can be coupled with the human need for rest and recreation if you don’t have to cook the meal yourself, get out of the house, and get to eat food you wouldn’t or couldn’t make for yourself. Both sports and restaurants can be enriching cultural activities.
Now, sports aren’t my thing, but I do like cheeseburgers, and so for Sunday lunch, I go to a local sports bar and grill, smoke my pipe, and have cheeseburgers to celebrate the Lord’s Day. The people who work there are thus helping me fulfill my human needs for rest and relaxation—as well as food and the joy proper to the Lord’s Day.
What’s more, by giving them my business on a Sunday, I’m helping them fulfill their human needs by letting them earn a living. And most people who work on Sunday tend to need to work on Sunday. If I just stayed home and denied them my business on this day, I’d thus be hurting them rather than helping them.
It’s similar to Jesus says in Matthew 12:
Have you not read in the Law how on the sabbath the priests in the temple profane the sabbath and are guiltless? (Matthew 12:5).
In ancient Israel, most people rested on the sabbath, but there were still some—like the priests—who worked on it, and they did so without guilt.
In the same way, it’s okay for most people today to take Sunday off and yet have some people—like people who work in sports or food service—do their jobs. It’s not the case that everybody has to go home and stay there all Sunday.
When I lived in California, I was happy to have the people at Jiffy Lube do my oil change on Sunday mornings. That let them earn the money they need.
But I was also happy that, here in Arkansas, the Jiffy Lube workers got Sundays off. That’s good, too. And here I give my Sunday business to restaurant workers.
It’s all a question of balance, and the underlying principle is that it’s okay for the majority of people to take Sundays off, while other people do the work that they need to do on Sundays, provided that they take care to set aside sufficient time for leisure and that their employers honor this obligation toward their employees—so they don’t make them work seven days a week.
Now, what happens if you’re one of the people who needs to work on a Sunday? Well, assuming that your employer isn’t denying you the time off that you need, you may well be grateful for the business that people provide. It’s letting you earn a living!
And it’s okay for you to work on Sunday—or any other holy day of obligation. You still need to attend Mass if at all possible, either on the Sunday or the preceding evening, and you need to do what you can to honor the spirit of the day. As the Catechism says:
If a country’s legislation or other reasons require work on Sunday, the day should nevertheless be lived as the day of our deliverance which lets us share [quoting from the book of Hebrews] in this “festal gathering,” this “assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven” [Hebrews 12:22-23] (CCC 2188).
Final Thoughts
So what can and can’t you do on a Sunday or holy day of obligation?
Well—first—the only hard and fast rule is go to Mass—either on Sunday itself or on the evening of the preceding day.
It doesn’t matter what Mass you go to. It doesn’t matter what readings you hear. All of the different Catholic rites use different calendars of readings, and canon law provides that:
Can. 1248 §1.
A person who assists at a Mass celebrated anywhere in a Catholic rite either on the feast day itself or in the evening of the preceding day satisfies the obligation of participating in the Mass.
Of course, if you can’t go to Mass, you’re excused from your Sunday obligation, but go to Mass if you can.
Second—beyond the obligation to attend Mass—there is no list of specific do’s and don’ts.
There used to be such a list back when 95% of society did physical labor, but that isn’t the case today.
So stop thinking in terms of a list of specific things you can do and specific things you can’t do. There is no such list now. The law adapts to your circumstances.
What you want to do is pursue the goals of the day, so you want to “abstain from those works and affairs which hinder the worship to be rendered to God, the joy proper to the Lord’s day, or the suitable relaxation of mind and body.”
To that end, it would likely be a good idea for you to do something different on Sundays—do things you don’t normally do.
To the extent possible, you also want to do things you enjoy—so as to bring you more joy on the Lord’s Day. Try doing things on Sunday that you don’t normally get a chance to do and that you’d look forward to doing.
You should also fulfill human needs, including your own, those of your family, and those of others—including the less fortunate and including giving your business to those who need to work on Sundays.
These same principles apply not just on Sundays but on other holy days of obligation, even if we have to work on them. It’s just that we’re often members of the group that needs to work on these days. Just apply the principles as best you can in the circumstances.
And finally, don’t be scrupulous. Remember, as Jesus said, “The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath.” Human needs take priority over rules about how we observe the day.
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