The Divine Lamp

To see other installments of this work in the order they should be read go HERE and HERE

1. Earthly goods, such as riches, honor, pleasure, cannot by themselves make us happy, for they cannot satisfy our soul, they often only make life better, and invariably forsake us in death.

Earthly goods deceive us; they are like soap-bubbles, which reflect all the colors of the rainbow but are really only drops of water. Earthly joys are like artificial fruit, beautiful to behold, but disappointing to the taste. Earthly pleasures are like water: they do not quench the fire of the passions, but only make it burn more fiercely. Man can no more be happy without God than a fish can live without water. Hence St Augustine says: “Restless is the heart of man, until it rests in God.” No sensible or material goods will nourish or satisfy the soul. Hence our Lord says to the Samaritan woman: “He who drinks of this water will thirst again.” Riches will no more staisfy the soul than salt water will quench thirst, In the days of the early empire of Rome, when riches and sensual pleasures abounded, suicide was most widely prevalent. Earthly possessions are a continual source of anxiety; he who rests in them is tormented by them, like a manwho reposes on thorns. As the fresh waters of the river are changed into the salt waters of the sea, so all earthly pleasures sooner or later turn into bitterness. Forbidden pleasures soon bring misery after them, like the forbidden fruit. Tjhey are like bait that has a hook concealed in it. Earthly goods all forsake us when we die: We brought nothing into this world, and certainly we can take nothing out of it.” When the Pope is crowned a handful of tow is kindled , and when it blazes up the choir sings: “Thus passes the glory of the world.” As a spider spins a web out of its own bowels and in a moment a broom sweeps it away, so amn labors long years to obrain some honor, or possessionj, or office. Some obstacle comes in the way, death or sickness visit him, and all his labor is gone for nothing. As the glow-worm shines in the night, but in the light of day is an ugly insect, so the deilights of earth are brilliant during the night of life on earth, but under the light of the day of judgment will show themselves to be vain and worthless.

Earthly goods are given to us only that through them we may attain eternal happiness.

Every earthly creature is intended as a step to bring us nearer to God. As in the workshop pf the painter, brushes, colors, oils, are all destined to serve to the completion of the picture, so all things in the world are intended to contribute to our eternal happiness in heave, Not to use earthly things for this end is to lose the hope of eternal happiness; but to make them our end and to be dependent upon them no less deprives us of the end for which they were created. Earthly goods are like the surgeons instruments; if the are ill-employed, they kill instead of cure. We must therefore use them only in so far as they help us towards the attainment of our last end. When they hinder us we must cut ourselves free from them. We must not serve them, they must serve us.

2. Only the Gospel of Christ is capable of giving us partial happiness on earth, for he who follows the teaching of Christ is certain to have peace of soul.

This is why Christ sayus to the Samaritan woman: “He that shall drink of the water that I’ll shall give him, shall not thirst forever.” And again: “He that comes to me shall never hunger.” The teaching of Christ can alone satisfy a man. The reason for this is, that earthly sufferings do not render unhappy the man who follows Christ.

3. He who follows Christ will have to endure persecution; but those persecutions can do him no harm.

St Paul tells us that “All who live godly lives in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.”

The whole life of the Christian is a carrying of the cross and a suffering of persecution. Christ Himself says: “The servant is not above the master.” That is, the servant of Christ has no claim to a better lot than his master Christ. We must expect the men of the world (that is, those who seek happiness in this life) to regard us as erratic people and as fools, to condemn us and to hate us. To be loved and praised by the world is to be the enemy of Christ. The principles of this world are in contradiction to those of Christ, and the world regards as a fool him whom Christ calls blessed.

Yet Christ tells us: “Everyone that hears my words and does them, shall be like a wise man who built his house upon rock.”

He who trusts in God builds on solid ground. The patriarch Joseph derived advantage, not from harm from persecution; the pious David was persecuted, first by Saul, and then by his own son Absalom. From his own experience he was able to say: “Many are the afflictions of the just, but out of them all the Lord will deliver them.” All the saints of Christ have been persecuted, but God has brought to good the evil their enemies thought to do to them. “If God is with us, who can be against us?”

4. Perfect happiness is impossible on earth; for no man can entirely avoid suffering.

The end of the worldly is misery, as we have seen, and the just man is persecuted. No one can escapes sickness, suffering, death. The world is a valley full of tears; it is a big hospital, containing as man sick men as their are human beings. The world is a place of banishment, where we are far from our true country. In the world good and ill succeed one another like sun and storm. Prosperity is the sure forerunner of adversity. In life we are on a sea, now lifted up to heaven, now cast down to hell. Society is always sure to full of all kinds of miseries, whatever efforts may be made to improve the conditions of mankind. Vain indeed are the hopes of the modern school of social democrats who dream of gradually abolishing all evil and misery in the world. (From THE CATECHISM EXPLAINED by Bishop Spirago

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Eternal happiness consists in union with God, through the exercise of the intellect contemplating God and the will loving Him. If we wish to attain it, we must begin to draw near to it in this life. We must seek to know and love God. But love of God consists in keeping his commandments (John 14:23). From this it follows that:

We shall attain to eternal happiness by the following means:

1. We must strive to know God by means of faith in the truths he has revealed to us.

Our Lord says: “This is eternal life, that they may know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, Whom Thou has sent(John 17:3). That is to say, the knowledge of God brings man to eternal happiness.

2. We must fulfill the will of God by keeping his commandments.

Our Lord says to the rich young man: If thou will enter into eternal life, keep the commandments.” (Matthew 19:17)

By means of our own strength we can neither believe or keep the commandments; for this we need the grace of God.

Even Adam and Eve in a state of innocence needed the help of grace. He who travels to a distant country, besides his own exertions needs money for the journey. The farmer cannot cultivate his land without the aid of sunshine and of rain. Man too, has a special weakness by reason of original sin. this makes grace all the more indispensable. The blind man needs a guide, the sick man food to strengthen him. We are like a man who through weakness has fallen to the ground, and has no power, of himself, to rise. He must look around for someone to come to his aid. So our Lord tells us: “without me you can do nothing” (John 15:5). As the sun is necessary to the earth, to enlighten and warm it, so is grace necessary to the soul.

We obtain the grace of God through the means of grace instituted by Jesus Christ.

3. We must therefore avail ourselves of the means of grace; of which the chief are the holy Mass, the sacraments, and prayer.

The means of grace are a channel through which grace is conveyed to our soul. Faith is the road which leads to heaven, the commandments are like sign-posts on the road, the means of grace the money for the journey. “The road that leads to life is narrow and thorny; the road that leads to destruction is broad, and many there are who travel down it” (Matthew 7:13).

It is also true that he who desires happiness must have religion.

Religion consists in a knowledge of God and a life corresponding to the will of God. Religion is not a matter of feeling; it is a matter of ones will and actions, and consists in following the principles that God has laid down. Mere knowledge does not constitute religion, else the devil would have religion; the service of God is necessarily included in it. We do not call a man a baseball player or a cricketer because he knows the rules and nature of the game; practice is also required.

It is also true that he who desires to be happy must strive to be like to God.

Man becomes like to God when all his thoughts and actions resemble divine though and action. The commandments of God are like a mirror, in which we recognize whether or not our actions are like or unlike those of God.–Francis Spirago, THE CATECHISM EXPLAINED

Posted by Dim Bulb. Check out my other site: CATHOLIC BOOKWORM

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All text in Italics represent my additions to the following quote.
As the scholar goes to school in order that afterwards he may attain a certain position in life, so man is placed on this earth so that he may attain to the lofty end of eternal happiness. As the servant serves his master and so earns his bread, so man has to serve God, and through his service attain happiness to some extent in this life, and in its fullness after death. (Meditation: Psalm 1) (What the current Catechism has to say about happiness)
We are on this earth in order that we may glorify God, and so win for ourselves eternal happiness.

The glory of God is the end of all creation, All creatures on earth are created for this end, that they may manifest in themselves the divine perfections and God’s dominion over his rational creatures, that is over angels and men, and that he may be loved and praised by them. Even the material world, and creatures not possessed of reason-animals, trees, plants, stones, metals, ect., all praise God after their own fashion: “The Lord has made all things for himself” (Proverbs 16:4). Man is created for this end, that he should proclaim the majesty of God. He must do so whether he wills it or not. The construction of the body of man, the lofty powers of his soul, the reward of the good, the punishment of the wicked, , all proclaim the majesty of God, his omnipotence, wisdom, goodness, justice, ect. Even the reprobate will have to contribute to the glory of God (Proverbs 16:4). In the end he will show how great is the justice and holiness of the Lord. Man, from being possessed of reason and free will, is through these able in a special way to give glory to God. This he does when he knows, loves, and honors God. Man is created chiefly for life beyond the grave. In this life he is a stranger, a wanderer, and a pilgrim. “We have not here a lasting city, but we seek one that is to come” (Hebrews 13:14). Heaven is our true country: here we are in exile. (Read what the current Catechism has to say on the individual believer and the Church as “pilgrim“.)
Hence we are not upon earth only to collect earthly treasures, to attain earthly honors, to eat and to drink, or to enjoy earthly pleasures. (See St Thomas Aquinas’ teaching on this matter)

He who pursues ends like these behaves as foolishly as a servant who, instead of serving his master, devotes himself to some passing amusement. He stands idle in the market-place, instead of working in his master vineyard. He is like a traveler who, attracted by the beauty of the scenery, does not pursue his journey, and so allows the night to overtake him. We are not made for earth; we are made to look upward to heaven. The trees and plants point upwards to heaven, as if to remind us that it is our home. For this reason our Lord says: “One thing is necessary” (Luke 10:42), and again, “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all other things shall be added unto you” (Matthew 6:33).

Unhappily, to many forget their last end, and fix their hearts on money, influence, honor, ect. They are like kings of that heathen country who, although they reigned but for a year and after that had to go and live on a barren island, spent all their time in luxury and feasting, and did not lay up any provisions for the future on the island to which they were bound. He who does not think on his last end is not a pilgrim, but a tramp, and falls into the hands of the devil as a tramp into the hands of the police. He is like a sailor who knows not where he is sailing, and so makes wreck of his ship. Our Lord compares such men to the servant who sleeps, instead of watching for his master’s coming (Matthew 24:42). -The Catechism Explained by Francis Spirago

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Have you ever tried to read or study St Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologica and found yourself bogged down at question 1, article 3? Perhaps, for you, the place to begin would be to read his compendium. What follows is an excerpt from that Compendium dealing with article 1 of the first question of the Summa. I have provided links to the Summa itself in case anyone wants to read through the articles in conjunction with the compendium; this might make going through the Summa a bit easier. I have also provided links to other sources for further ease.

Chapter 1 SACRED DOCTRINE: ITS NATURE AND EXTENT In this chapter the saint deals with the first question of the Summa: “The Nature and Extent of Sacred Doctrine” which is divided into ten articles.

Article 1 of the Summa looks at the question: Whether, besides philosophy, any further doctrine is required?

This is treated in the first paragraph of the Comp:

• It is necessary for the salvation of man that, besides the natural sciences, there should exist some doctrine received by revelation which transcends reason. Moreover, that which is discoverable about God by human reason could be known only by a few, and that after much time, and not without a large admixture of error. It was good, therefore, for man to be taught by means of a doctrine divinely revealed; for salvation, which is in God, depends upon the knowledge of the truth.

St Thomas deals with this subject more fully in chapters 2, 3 & 4 of the Summa Contra Gentes. For more, see the full text of THE CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA article on revelation, especially the first 3 sections on pages 1-3. You can also profitably consult chapter 1 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, as well as chapter 2.

For links to many online books and articles, podcasts and videos of interest to Catholics, please see the pages on my other site.

Return to main site.

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Today I would like to begins a series of posts designed to give a broad outline of Salvation History and Biblical theology. Whenever possible I would like to include both Catechetical and moral teachings as well. I plan on (hopefully) issuing one post per week in order to give the reader sufficient time to read as many of the links I supply as possible. Obviously, some subjects will have more links than others.

Bible Readings:

1. Genesis 1:1-2:4a The 7 days of creation (note: 4a means the first part of verse 4. 4b would mean the second part)
2. Job 38-39 A meditation on God’s wisdom and power in creation, and man’s ignorance concerning this mystery. As Aquinas said in his Commentary on the Book of Job “God certainly does not question to learn, but to convince man of his ignorance.”

Catechesis:

1. The importance of Catechesis on Creation.
2. Creation as a work of the Triune God. (More will be said on Son’s role in creation next week)
3. Reason for creation.
4. The Mystery of Creation
5. Pope John Paul II (God is the Lord of Creation and History)
6. Pope John Paul II (On the importance of creation)
7. Pope John Paul II on the Importance of the Sabbath.
8. St Basil’s Hexaemeron (St Basil’s exegetical Homilies on the creation)
9. Six Days To Create?  (The view of some of the Fathers might surprise you)

Moral demands: (More will be said in week 3 when we look at the second creation account)

1. The Sanctification of the World and the Protection of Creation (Scroll down to article 92)
2. We Must Safeguard the Environment (Read articles 451-487. At the very least, read those under the heading “Biblical aspects.”)
3. God Made Man the Steward of Creation (Pope John Paul II)
   

Prayers:

1. Psalm 148
2. Psalm 104
3. Psalm 19:1-6 (I’ve linked to the RSV here. The NAB would be vss 2-7)
4. Canticle of Daniel 3:52-90 (From the WEB Bible)
5. The Confessions of St Augustine: Books 11, 12, 13
   

Meditations:

1. John Paul II on Psalm 148
2. John Paul II on Psalm 119
3. John Paul II on Canticle of Daniel (Comments on most, but not all of it)

Further Readings;

1. Theology and Sanity (A classic introduction to Catholic theology. The site is a bit difficult to use. Scroll down to the Theology heading and click on “Theology and Sanity.” A menu will appear on the left side of page. Click on “Creatures”, another menu will appear. Click on and read numbers 10 and 11. If you don’t know much about Catholic theology, it’s worth the trouble.)
2. Trinity and God the Creator (Definitely not for the beginner)
3. Pope Benedict XVI (A World Day of Peace message on the task entrusted to Human Beings in light of creation)
4. Covenant Love: An Introduction To The Biblical Worldview (A six part study which gives an excellent introduction to Biblical theology.)

If anyone has any further suggestions on any of the categories please let me know. Also, nest weeks post will be on the second creation account, and the third weeks will be on the Son’s role in creation; any suggestions or links would be appreciated.

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For the Christian, Sunday is above all an Easter celebration, wholly illumined by the glory of the Risen Christ. It is the festival of the “new creation”. Yet, when understood in depth, this aspect is inseparable from what the first pages of Scripture tell us of the plan of God in the creation of the world. It is true that the Word was made flesh in “the fullness of time” (Gal 4:4); but it is also true that, in virtue of the mystery of his identity as the eternal Son of the Father, he is the origin and end of the universe. As John writes in the Prologue of his Gospel: “Through him all things were made, and without him was made nothing that was made” (1:3). Paul too stresses this in writing to the Colossians: “In him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible …. All things were created through him and for him” (1:16). This active presence of the Son in the creative work of God is revealed fully in the Paschal Mystery, in which Christ, rising as “the first fruits of those who had fallen asleep” (1 Cor 15:20), established the new creation and began the process which he himself will bring to completion when he returns in glory to “deliver the kingdom to God the Father …, so that God may be everything to everyone” (1 Cor 15:24,28). Already at the dawn of creation, therefore, the plan of God implied Christ’s “cosmic mission”. This Christocentric perspective, embracing the whole arc of time, filled God’s well-pleased gaze when, ceasing from all his work, he “blessed the seventh day and made it holy” (Gn 2:3). According to the Priestly writer of the first biblical creation story, then was born the “Sabbath”, so characteristic of the first Covenant, and which in some ways foretells the sacred day of the new and final Covenant. The theme of “God’s rest” (cf. Gn 2:2) and the rest which he offered to the people of the Exodus when they entered the Promised Land (cf. Ex 33:14; Dt 3:20; 12:9; Jos 21:44; Ps 95:11) is re-read in the New Testament in the light of the definitive “Sabbath rest” (Heb 4:9) into which Christ himself has entered by his Resurrection. The People of God are called to enter into this same rest by persevering in Christ’s example of filial obedience (cf. Heb 4:3-16). In order to grasp fully the meaning of Sunday, therefore, we must re-read the great story of creation and deepen our understanding of the theology of the “Sabbath”.

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth” (Gn 1:1)

9. The poetic style of the Genesis story conveys well the awe which people feel before the immensity of creation and the resulting sense of adoration of the One who brought all things into being from nothing. It is a story of intense religious significance, a hymn to the Creator of the universe, pointing to him as the only Lord in the face of recurring temptations to divinize the world itself. At the same time, it is a hymn to the goodness of creation, all fashioned by the mighty and merciful hand of God.

“God saw that it was good” (Gn 1:10,12, etc.). Punctuating the story as it does, this refrain sheds a positive light upon every element of the universe and reveals the secret for a proper understanding of it and for its eventual regeneration: the world is good insofar as it remains tied to its origin and, after being disfigured by sin, it is again made good when, with the help of grace, it returns to the One who made it. It is clear that this process directly concerns not inanimate objects and animals but human beings, who have been endowed with the incomparable gift and risk of freedom. Immediately after the creation stories, the Bible highlights the dramatic contrast between the grandeur of man, created in the image and likeness of God, and the fall of man, which unleashes on the world the darkness of sin and death (cf. Gn 3).

10. Coming as it does from the hand of God, the cosmos bears the imprint of his goodness. It is a beautiful world, rightly moving us to admiration and delight, but also calling for cultivation and development. At the “completion” of God’s work, the world is ready for human activity. “On the seventh day God finished his work which he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done” (Gn 2:2). With this anthropomorphic image of God’s “work”, the Bible not only gives us a glimpse of the mysterious relationship between the Creator and the created world, but also casts light upon the task of human beings in relation to the cosmos. The “work” of God is in some ways an example for man, called not only to inhabit the cosmos, but also to “build” it and thus become God’s “co-worker”. As I wrote in my Encyclical Laborem Exercens, the first chapters of Genesis constitute in a sense the first “gospel of work”.(10) This is a truth which the Second Vatican Council also stressed: “Created in God’s image, man was commissioned to subdue the earth and all it contains, to rule the world in justice and holiness, and, recognizing God as the creator of all things, to refer himself and the totality of things to God so that with everything subject to God, the divine name would be glorified in all the earth”.(11)

The exhilarating advance of science, technology and culture in their various forms — an ever more rapid and today even overwhelming development — is the historical consequence of the mission by which God entrusts to man and woman the task and responsibility of filling the earth and subduing it by means of their work, in the observance of God’s Law.

“Shabbat”: the Creator’s joyful rest

11. If the first page of the Book of Genesis presents God’s “work” as an example for man, the same is true of God’s “rest”: “On the seventh day God finished his work which he had done” (Gn 2:2). Here too we find an anthropomorphism charged with a wealth of meaning.

It would be banal to interpret God’s “rest” as a kind of divine “inactivity”. By its nature, the creative act which founds the world is unceasing and God is always at work, as Jesus himself declares in speaking of the Sabbath precept: “My Father is working still, and I am working” (Jn 5:17). The divine rest of the seventh day does not allude to an inactive God, but emphasizes the fullness of what has been accomplished. It speaks, as it were, of God’s lingering before the “very good” work (Gn 1:31) which his hand has wrought, in order to cast upon it a gaze full of joyous delight. This is a “contemplative” gaze which does not look to new accomplishments but enjoys the beauty of what has already been achieved. It is a gaze which God casts upon all things, but in a special way upon man, the crown of creation. It is a gaze which already discloses something of the nuptial shape of the relationship which God wants to establish with the creature made in his own image, by calling that creature to enter a pact of love. This is what God will gradually accomplish, in offering salvation to all humanity through the saving covenant made with Israel and fulfilled in Christ. It will be the Word Incarnate, through the eschatological gift of the Holy Spirit and the configuration of the Church as his Body and Bride, who will extend to all humanity the offer of mercy and the call of the Father’s love.

12. In the Creator’s plan, there is both a distinction and a close link between the order of creation and the order of salvation. This is emphasized in the Old Testament, when it links the “shabbat” commandment not only with God’s mysterious “rest” after the days of creation (cf. Ex 20:8-11), but also with the salvation which he offers to Israel in the liberation from the slavery of Egypt (cf. Dt 5:12-15). The God who rests on the seventh day, rejoicing in his creation, is the same God who reveals his glory in liberating his children from Pharaoh’s oppression. Adopting an image dear to the Prophets, one could say that in both cases God reveals himself as the bridegroom before the bride (cf. Hos 2:16-24; Jer 2:2; Is 54:4-8).

As certain elements of the same Jewish tradition suggest,(12) to reach the heart of the “shabbat“, of God’s “rest”, we need to recognize in both the Old and the New Testament the nuptial intensity which marks the relationship between God and his people. Hosea, for instance, puts it thus in this marvellous passage: “I will make for you a covenant on that day with the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the creeping things of the ground; and I will abolish the bow, the sword, and war from the land; and I will make you lie down in safety. And I will betroth you to me for ever; I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy. I will betroth you to me in faithfulness; and you shall know the Lord” (2:18-20).

“God blessed the seventh day and made it holy” (Gn 2:3)

13. The Sabbath precept, which in the first Covenant prepares for the Sunday of the new and eternal Covenant, is therefore rooted in the depths of God’s plan. This is why, unlike many other precepts, it is set not within the context of strictly cultic stipulations but within the Decalogue, the “ten words” which represent the very pillars of the moral life inscribed on the human heart. In setting this commandment within the context of the basic structure of ethics, Israel and then the Church declare that they consider it not just a matter of community religious discipline but a defining and indelible expression of our relationship with God, announced and expounded by biblical revelation. This is the perspective within which Christians need to rediscover this precept today. Although the precept may merge naturally with the human need for rest, it is faith alone which gives access to its deeper meaning and ensures that it will not become banal and trivialized.

14. In the first place, therefore, Sunday is the day of rest because it is the day “blessed” by God and “made holy” by him, set apart from the other days to be, among all of them, “the Lord’s Day”.

In order to grasp fully what the first of the biblical creation accounts means by keeping the Sabbath “holy”, we need to consider the whole story, which shows clearly how every reality, without exception, must be referred back to God. Time and space belong to him. He is not the God of one day alone, but the God of all the days of humanity.

Therefore, if God “sanctifies” the seventh day with a special blessing and makes it “his day” par excellence, this must be understood within the deep dynamic of the dialogue of the Covenant, indeed the dialogue of “marriage”. This is the dialogue of love which knows no interruption, yet is never monotonous. In fact, it employs the different registers of love, from the ordinary and indirect to those more intense, which the words of Scripture and the witness of so many mystics do not hesitate to describe in imagery drawn from the experience of married love.

15. All human life, and therefore all human time, must become praise of the Creator and thanksgiving to him. But man’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 relationship par excellence when men and women raise their song to God and become the voice of all creation.

This is precisely why it is also the day of rest. Speaking vividly as it does of “renewal” and “detachment”, the interruption of the often oppressive rhythm of work expresses the dependence of man and the cosmos upon God. Everything belongs to God! The Lord’s Day returns again and again to declare this principle within the weekly reckoning of time. The “Sabbath” has therefore been interpreted evocatively as a determining element in the kind of “sacred architecture” of time which marks biblical revelation.(13) It recalls that the universe and history belong to God; and without a constant awareness of that truth, man cannot serve in the world as co-worker of the Creator.

To “keep holy” by “remembering”

16. The commandment of the Decalogue by which God decrees the Sabbath observance is formulated in the Book of Exodus in a distinctive way: “Remember the Sabbath day in order to keep it holy” (20:8). And the inspired text goes on to give the reason for this, recalling as it does the work of God: “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” (v. 11). Before decreeing that something be done, the commandment urges that something be remembered. It is a call to awaken remembrance of the grand and fundamental work of God which is creation, a remembrance which must inspire the entire religious life of man and then fill the day on which man is called to rest. Rest therefore acquires a sacred value: the faithful are called to rest not only as God rested, but to rest in the Lord, bringing the entire creation to him, in praise and thanksgiving, intimate as a child and friendly as a spouse.

17. The connection between Sabbath rest and the theme of “remembering” God’s wonders is found also in the Book of Deuteronomy (5:12-15), where the precept is grounded less in the work of creation than in the 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” (Dt 5:15).

This formulation complements the one we have already seen; and taken together, the two reveal the meaning of “the Lord’s Day” within a single theological vision which fuses creation and salvation. Therefore, the main point of the precept is not just any kind of interruption of work, but the celebration of the marvels which God has wrought.

Insofar as this “remembrance” is alive, full of thanksgiving and of the praise of God, human rest on the Lord’s Day takes on its full meaning. It is then that man enters the depths of God’s “rest” and can experience a tremor of the Creator’s joy when, after the creation, he saw that all he had made “was very good” (Gn 1:31).

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