SAINT JOSEPH COLLEGE

THEOLOGY DEPARTMENT
Maasin City, Southern Leyte

MODULE 1
(THEO 3B:
THE COMMANDMENTS)
1st Semester, AY 2020-2021

Prepared by:
REV. MSGR. MARNITO BANSIG
Instructor
 Saint Joseph College

Course Description

This course explores the Ten Commandments of God & discusses the contents & the Church’s
Teachings contained in each Commandment w/ emphasis on doctrine, moral & worship.

Grading System

Each student shall be assessed on the following:

Quizzes 20%
Activity and Assignment 20%
Attendance and Religious Involvement 10%
Pre-Midterm/Pre-Final Test 25%
Midterm/Final Examination 25%
TOTAL 100%

Learning Outcomes

At the end of the semester, the students must be able:

1. To discover the right ways of Christian Morality

2. To incorporate into their lives Catholic Morals as related to God, self & neighbour
3. To become better acquainted w/ desirable attitudes necessary for total Christian life
4. To actualize lived values based on moral conscience

MODULE 1

Topic Outline

 Lesson 1: Introduction - Understanding the Commandments

 Lesson 2: 1st Commandment: “I am the Lord Your God. You shall not have other gods

beside Me.”

a. Fruits of the 1st Commandment

b. Virtues of the 1st Commandment, Its Commands & Prohibitions

c. A Carved or Graven Image

 Lesson 3: 2nd Commandment: “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.”

a. The Name of the Lord is Holy b. Taking the Name of the Lord in Vain

c. The Christian Name

 Lesson 4: 3rd Commandment: “Remember to keep holy the Lord’s Day.”

a. The Sabbath Day b. Easter: New Sabbath c. The Church & the Lord’s Day

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Lesson 1: Introduction: Understanding the Commandments

I. OBJECTIVES:

At the end of the lesson, you must be able:

 To present that the Commandments are God’s guide for us so as to follow Him in the way to life
eternal
 To appreciate the applicability of the Commandments
 To pray to the Holy Spirit for the grace of enlightenment to understand the Commandments and
the grace of strength to live concretely by them in the daily life

II. INTRODUCTION

Engage/Explore

*Viewing of the 20-Minute Movie: “The Ten Commandments”

 Make a reflection that can fill up a ½ cross-wise of paper about the viewed movie.

Explain/Elaborate

Ten Commandments - now completed by Christ, are seen as a privileged expression of the “way of life.”
- are a classical structure for Christian moral teaching.
- express God’s will for us, not as set of arbitrary instructions but as a loving
providence.
God’s grace makes us possible to do His commands. For us Christians, 10 Commandments take on a
whole new perspective > that of deep personal faith & loyalty to Christ.

Filipino Context

The first thing that comes to mind to many Filipino Catholics when asked about morality is the “Ten
Commandments.” As Christians, they usually hear “moral talk” in the form either of warnings against sin
& breaking God’s laws or of pious spiritual exhortations on love & happiness. It is rare that either form is
related to the other; if taken separately, neither the Commandments nor love offers true picture of daily
life where love & moral responsibility are linked.

The truth is that the Ten Commandments are actually moral imperatives of how to love others & to
follow Christ’s own command to love

But in the popular mind of many Filipinos, Ten Commandments are linked w/ the story learned as
children about Moses coming down from Mt. Sinai w/ the two stone tablets-one dealing w/ our relations
w/ God, & the other w/ our relations w/ one another. Since the story is remembered from childhood days,
it unfortunately is often understood in rather childish ways. God’s commandments are viewed as
something imposed that must not be broken otherwise you get punished. They are not related in any way

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w/ love or friendship or fidelity. Thus, many adult Filipino Catholics don’t see any direct connection
between this story & their moral actions.

More recently an opposite reaction has become quite common among certain socially oriented Pinoys.
They react against the overly devotional ritualism & moralistic attitudes of some pious church-goers.
Being committed to justice & liberation, they have little or no time for talk of sin & God. Thus, these
well-intentioned Christians don’t seem to see any particular connection between their moral lives & the
Ten Commandments.

But let us not obscure the basic unity of Ten Commandments. They form an organic whole: none
relates w/ God while sinning one’s neighbor & vice-versa.

A proper understanding of Ten Commandments is often difficult for Filipino Catholics because of the
manner in w/c they have often been taught & memorized in catechism classes. Presented as characteristic
of Old Testament, Ten Commandments were viewed as the law imposed by divine Judge who watches
everyone. Eternal punishment is the final end of all transgressors.

Such OT picture of God is contrasted in overly simplified way w/ Christ’s new Spirit w/c allegedly
liberates us from all laws. Yet upon reflection, this easy contrast is mistaken. When asked what one must
do to possess eternal life, Jesus replied by quoting the Commandments. He did not abolish but rather gave
them the right view.

Value of Ten Commandments for Filipino Catholics Today:

1. Ten Commandments constitute basic imperatives needed for life in community. >They sketch for us
parameters w/n w/c we must live our life w/ our redeeming Lord & among ourselves.

2. They can be grounded in their historical origin, their covenantal character & their liberating power. >
Originated not from particular process of philosophizing but from concrete historical events of Exodus &
Mt. Sinai, to interpret the Commandments legalistically in abstract generalization is to wrench them from
their living origin in God’s creative saving will.

3. They are terms of the Covenant. > “Ten Words” (Decalogue) w/c reveal the pattern of righteous life in
God’s sight lead us to happiness. They are not a thing of the past but an open-ended Covenant event
looking over to the future.

4. They provide the signposts to authentic responsible freedom. > They warn us from legalistic
misunderstanding of freedom on one side & from freedom mistaken as lawless license & irresponsible
spontaneity on other.

Ten Commandments set us free from all enslavements by nature (from nature worship), history (from
historical fatalism) or death (that can’t stand against God’s liberating presence).

With Christ’s new law of love, they are to be understood as dynamically forming together a consistent
pattern for Christian moral living. The Gospel of God’s redeeming grace precedes the Law.

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The Decalogue in the Sacred Scripture

God revealed these “Ten Words” to His people on the holy mountain. They are eminently God’s
words. They are handed on to us in the books of Exodus & Deuteronomy. Beginning w/ Old Testament,
the sacred books refer to the “Ten Words” but it is in the New Covenant in Jesus Christ that their full
meaning will be revealed.

The Decalogue must first be understood in the context of the Exodus, God’s liberating event at the
center of the Old Covenant. Whether formulated as negative commandments, prohibitions, or as positive
precepts, the “Ten Words” point out conditions of a life freed from the slavery of sin. Thus, the
Decalogue is a path of life.

The “Ten Words” are pronounced by God in the midst of a theophany & is a gift of God Himself &
His holy will. The gift of the Commandments is part of the Covenant God sealed w/ His people. The
Covenant shows that He loves His people first. Living a moral life according to “Ten Words” is man’s
response to this God’s loving initiative.

The Decalogue in the Church’s Tradition

In fidelity to Scripture & in conformity w/ the example of Jesus, the tradition of the Church has
acknowledged the primordial importance & significance of the Decalogue.

The Ten Commandments state what is required in love of God & love of neighbor. The first three
concern love of God & the other seven, love of neighbor.

The Unity of the Decalogue

The two tablets shed light on one another, they form an organic unity. To trans-gress one commandment
is to infringe all the others. One cannot honor another person w/o blessing God his Creator. One cannot
adore God w/o loving all men His creatures. The Decalogue brings man’s religious & social life into
unity.

The Decalogue and the Natural Law

The Ten Commandments belong to God’s revelation. They bring to light the essential duties and
therefore indirectly the fundamental rights inherent in the nature of the human person. We know God’s
commandments through the divine revelation proposed to us in the Church & through the voice of moral
conscience.

The Obligation of the Decalogue

Since they express man’s fundamental duties towards God & his neighbor, the Ten Commandments
reveal, in their primordial content, grave obligations. They are fundamentally immutable, & they oblige
always & everywhere. No one can dispense from them.

Lesson 2: First Commandment: “I am the Lord Your God,

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You shall not have other gods beside Me.”

I. OBJECTIVES:

At the end of the lesson, you must be able:

 To explain how Jesus showed His total commitment to God in making God as the number one in
His life
 To appreciate the humility and strength of Jesus in allowing Himself to be tempted and in
overcoming them all
 To pray with confidence the “Our Father” in acknowledging the Lordship of the Father and in
overcoming the temptations in life

II. INTRODUCTION

Engage/Explore

 Activity: Make a list of priorities in life you aspire to attain with the corresponding ways of
attaining them.

Explain/Elaborate

This Commandment is “first” not just because it heads the list but it is the most important. From it,
all the other commandments are derived & governed. To know & love God & gratefully accept His
Lordship is the foundation of all Christian moral life. In revealing Himself as outgoing creative Love,
God calls every person to share in His love through a life of faith, hope & charity. True happiness & our
final destiny is achieved within the framework revealed in God’s laws. As Christ taught , “Eternal life is
this: to know You, only true God & Him You have sent, Jesus Christ” (Jn 17:3).
Fruits of the First Commandment

 The uniqueness & oneness of God stressed by the first Commandment is a liberating truth
because adoration of the one God frees us from slavery to & idolatry of the world.
 God’s unique oneness is also a reconciling truth since the one God, as Father of us all, makes us
one family. Despite the endless struggles among nations & peoples, & our own conflicts &
misunderstandings, we realize God created the whole world for unity & order.
 Finally, the oneness of God is a loving truth in that it makes possible a genuine unified love of
God. For the One God has no rivals, so we love Him w/ our whole heart completely & above all.

As a liberating, reconciling & loving truth, the Oneness of God can be the basis of our personal
freedom, our unity w/ all our brothers & sisters under our Heavenly Father, & our love for one another.
This basis is expressed in our renewal of Baptismal vows during the Easter Vigil Eucharistic celebration.

Virtues of the First Commandment

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The First Commandment embraces FAITH, HOPE & CHARITY.

FAITH

Our moral life has its source in faith in God Who reveals His love to us. The 1 st Commandment
requires us to nourish & protect our faith w/ prudence& vigilance, & to reject everything that is opposed
to it. There are various ways of sinning against our faith in God:

- Voluntary doubt about the faith disregards or refuses to hold as true what God has revealed and
the Church proposes for belief.
- Involuntary doubt refers to hesitation in believing, difficulty in overcoming objections connected
w/ the faith, or also anxiety aroused by its obscurity.

If deliberately cultivated, doubt can lead to spiritual blindness.

- Incredulity is the neglect of revealed truth or the willful refusal to assent to it.
- Heresy is the obstinate post-baptismal denial of some truth w/c must be believed w/ divine &
catholic faith, or is also obstinate doubt concerning same.
- Apostasy is the total repudiation of the Christian faith.
- Schism is the refusal of submission to the Pope or of communion w/ members of the Church
subject to him.

HOPE

When God reveals Himself & calls him, man cannot fully respond to the divine love by his own
powers. Man must hope that God will give him the capacity to love Him in return & to act in conformity
w/ the commandments of charity. Hope is the confident expectation of divine blessing & beatific vision of
God. It is also the fear of offending God’s love & of incurring punishment. The 1 st Commandment is also
concerned w/ sins against hope in God:

- Despair makes man cease to hope for his personal salvation from God, for help in attaining it or
for the forgiveness of his sins. It is contrary to God’s goodness, to His justice –for the Lord is
faithful to His promises- & to His mercy.
- Presumption is either man presumes upon his capacities (hoping to ably save Himself w/o help
from on high) or he presumes upon God’s almighty power or His mercy (hoping to obtain His
forgiveness w/o conversion, and glory w/o merit).

CHARITY

Faith in God’s love encompasses the call & the obligation to respond w/ sincere love to divine charity.
The 1st Commandment enjoins us to love God above everything. One can sin against God’s love in
various ways:

- Indifference neglects or refuses to reflect on divine charity. It fails to consider its prevenient
goodness & denies its power.
- Ingratitude fails or refuses to acknowledge divine charity & to return him love for love.
- Lukewarmness is hesitation or negligence in responding to divine love. It can imply refusal to
give oneself over to the prompting of charity.

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- Acedia or spiritual sloth goes so far as to refuse the joy that comes from God & to be repelled by
divine goodness.
- Hatred of God comes from pride & is contrary to love of God whose goodness it denies & whom
it presumes to curse as the one who forbids sins & inflicts punishments.

Charity leads us to render to God what we as creatures owe Him in all justice. Thus, the virtue of
religion disposes us to have these attitudes:

 Adoration to God is to acknowledge Him as God, as the Creator & Savior, the Lord & Master of
everything that exists, as infinite & merciful Love. To adore God is to praise & exalt Him and to
humble oneself, as Mary did in the magnificat, confessing w/ gratitude that He has done great
things and holy is His name.

 Prayer, as lifting up the mind toward God, is an expression of our adoration of God: prayer of
praise & thanksgiving, intercession & petition. It is an indispensable condition for being able to
obey God’s Commandments. The acts of faith, hope & charity enjoined by the 1 st Commandment
are accomplished in prayer.

 Sacrifice is every action done so as to cling to God in communion of holiness and thus achieve
blessedness. The prophets of the Old Covenant often denounced sacrifices that were not from the
heart and not coupled w/ love of neighbor. Christ made the perfect sacrifice when He offered
Himself on the Cross as a total offering to the Father’s love and for our salvation. By uniting
ourselves w/ His sacrifice we can make our lives a living sacrifice to God.

 Promises and Vows

In many circumstances, the Christian is called to make promises to God, like in Baptism,
Confirmation, Matrimony or Holy Orders. Out of personal devotion the Christian may also promise to
God this action, that prayer, this almsgiving and so forth. Fidelity to promises made to God is a sign of
the respect owed to the divine Majesty and of love to a faithful God.

Vow is a deliberate & free promise made to God concerning a possible & better good w/c must be
fulfilled by reason of the virtue of religion. It is an act of devotion in w/c Christian dedicates himself to
God. By fulfilling his vow, he renders to God what has been promised and consecrated to Him.

 The social duty of religion and the right to religious freedom

All men are bound to seek the truth, especially in what concerns God & His Church, and to embrace it
& hold on to it as they come to know it. This duty derives from the very dignity of the human person.

The duty of offering God genuine worship concerns man both individually & socially. By constantly
evangelizing men, the Church works toward enabling them to infuse the Christian spirit into the mentality
& mores, laws & structures of the communities in w/c they live. The social duty of Christians is to respect
& awaken in each man the love of the true & the good. It requires them to make known the worship of the
one true religion w/c subsists in the Catholic & apostolic Church.

Nobody may be forced to act against his convictions, nor is anyone to be restrained from acting in
accordance w/ his conscience in religious matters in private or in public, alone or in association w/ others

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w/n due limits. But this right to religious liberty is neither a moral license to adhere to error, nor a
supposed right to error but rather a natural right of the human person to civil liberty w/n the just limits
from external constraint in religious matters by political authorities.

The 1st Commandment forbids honoring gods other than the one Lord Who has revealed Himself to
His people. These are some ways of having other gods:

 Superstition is the deviation of religious feeling and of the practices this feeling imposes. It can
even affect the worship we offer the true God, e.g when one attributes an importance in some way
magical to certain practices otherwise lawful or necessary. To attribute the efficacy of prayers or
of sacramental signs to their mere external performance, apart from the interior dispositions that
they demand, is to fall into superstition.

 Idolatry consists in divinizing what is not God. Man commits idolatry when- ever he honors and
reveres a creature in place of God, whether this be gods or demons, power, pleasure, race,
ancestors, the state, money, etc. It does not only refer to false pagan worship. It remains a
constant temptation to faith. The commandment to worship the Lord alone integrates man and
saves him from endless disintegration. It is a perversion of man’s innate religious sense.

Those who worship empty idols make themselves empty. Those who make them are like them, so are
all who trust in them.

 Divination and Magic

God can reveal the future to his prophets or to other saints. A sound Christian attitude consists in
putting oneself confidently into the hands of Providence for whatever concerns the future, and giving up
unhealthy curiosity about it. Improvidence, however, can constitute lack of responsibility.

- All forms of divination are to be rejected: recourse to Satan or demons, conjuring up the dead or other
practices falsely supposed to unveil the future. Consulting horoscopes, astrology, palm reading,
interpretation of omens & lots, phenomena of clairvoyance, and recourse to mediums – all conceal a
desire for power over time, history, and in last analysis, other human beings, as well as a wish to
conciliate hidden powers. They contradict the honor, respect & loving fear that we owe to God alone.

- All practices of magic & sorcery by w/c one attempts to tame occult powers so as to place them at
one’s service and have a supernatural power over others -even for the sake of restoring their health- are
gravely contrary to the virtue of religion. These practices are even more to be condemned when
accompanied by the intention of harming someone or when they have recourse to demon’s intervention.
Wearing charms is also reprehensible.

- Spiritism often implies divination or magical practices. The Church for her part warns the faithful
against it. Recourse to so-called traditional cures does not justify either the invocation of evil powers or
exploiting other’s credulity.

 Irreligion

God’s 1st Commandment condemns the main sins of irreligion:

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- Tempting God consists in putting his goodness & almighty power to test by word or deed. This
was what Satan did to Jesus in the desert. The challenge contained in it wounds the respect &
trust we owe our Creator & Lord. It always harbors doubt about His love, His providence & His
power.

- Sacrilege consists in profaning or treating unworthily the sacraments & other liturgical actions,
as well as persons, things or places consecrated to God. It is a grave sin especially when
committed against the Eucharist for in this sacrament the true Body of Christ is made
substantially present for us.

- Simony is defined as the buying or selling of spiritual things. To Simon the magician who
wanted to buy the spiritual powers of the apostles, St. Peter responded: “Your silver perishes w/
you because you thought you could obtain God’s gift w/ money! (Acts 8:20). It is impossible to
appropriate to oneself spiritual goods & behave toward them as their owner or master for they
have their source in God. One can receive them only from him w/o payment.

 Atheism rejects or denies God’s existence & covers different phenomena:

- Practical materialism restricts its needs & aspirations to space & time.

- Atheistic humanism falsely considers man to be an end to himself and the sole maker w/ supreme
control of his own history.

- Contemporary atheism looks for the liberation of man through economic & social liberation. It
holds that religion thwarts such emancipation by raising man’s hope in a future life, thus both
deceiving & discouraging him from working for better life on earth.

Atheism is often based on a false conception of human autonomy, exaggerated to the point of refusing
any dependence on God. The imputability of this offense can be diminished in virtue of the intentions &
circumstances.

 Agnosticism refrains from denying God, instead postulates the existence of a transcendent being
incapable of revealing itself & thus nothing can be said about. It can sometimes include a certain
search for God but it can express indifferentism, flight from ultimate question of existence &
sluggish conscience

…A Carved or Graven Image?

Nevertheless, already in the Old Testament, God ordained or permitted the making of images that
pointed symbolically toward salvation by Incarnate Word, like bronze serpent, ark of the covenant. Even
Jesus used bread & wine. Christian veneration of images is not against 1 st Commandment w/c proscribes
idols. The honor rendered to an image passes to the person portrayed in it.

Lesson 3
Second Commandment: “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.”

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I. OBJECTIVES:

At the end of the lesson, you must be able:

- To state and explain the meaning of the 2nd commandment

- To explain how the 2nd commandment is violated
- To use God’s name with reverence and respect everything that is related with God
- To participate fully during worship or liturgical activity

II. INTRODUCTION

Engage/Explore

 What word-expression/s you usually utter in your day-to-day life and what situation/s that move/s
you to utter such expression/s?

Explain/Elaborate

The Name of the Lord is Holy

The 2nd Commandment prescribes respect for the Lord’s name. Like the 1st Commandment, it belongs
to the virtue of religion & more particularly it governs our use of speech in sacred matters.

Among all the word of Revelation, there is one which is unique: God’s revealed name. He confides
His name to those who believe in Him, in His personal mystery. The gift of a name belongs to order of
trust & intimacy.

The Lord’s name is holy. For this reason man must not abuse it. He must keep it in mind in silent
loving adoration. He will not introduce it into his own speech except to bless, praise & glorify it. Respect
for His name is an expression of the respect owed to the mystery of God Himself and to the sacred reality
it evokes.

The 2nd Commandment forbids the use of God’s name, i.e., improper use of the names of God, Jesus
Christ, also of Virgin Mary & all saints.

> Promises made to others in God’s name engage the divine honor, fidelity, truthfulness & authority.
They must be respected in justice. To be unfaithful to promises is to misuse God’s name and in some way
to make God out to be liar.

> Blasphemy is directly opposed to 2nd Commandment. It consists in uttering against God – inwardly or
outwardly – words of hatred, reproach, defiance, in speaking ill of God, in failing to respect toward Him
in one’s speech, in misusing God’s name. St. James condemns those who blasphemes that honorable
name of Jesus (Jas 2:7). The prohibition of blasphemy extends to language against Christ’s Church, saints
& sacred things. It is also blasphemous to make use of God’s name to cover up criminal practices, to
reduce peoples to servitude or to torture persons. Blasphemy is contrary to respect due to God & His holy
name.

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> Cursing is calling down punishment from God on others. It is a misuse of power in God’s name.
Religion should never be a tool for frightening people.

> Oaths w/c misuse God’s name, though w/o the intention of blasphemy, show lack of respect for the
Lord. The 2nd Commandment also forbids magical use of the divine name.

The misuse of God’s name to commit a crime can provoke others to repudiate religion.

Taking the Name of the Lord in Vain

The 2nd Commandment forbids false oaths. Using God’s name in making an oath is to take God as
witness to what one affirms. It is to invoke the divine truthfulness so as to support one’s own truthfulness.
If false, then it is bad. Thus rejection of false oath is a duty toward God. As Creator & Lord, God is the
norm of all truth. When it is truthful & legitimate, an oath highlights the relationship of human speech w/
God’s truth. A false oath calls on God to be witness to a lie.

A person commits a perjury when he makes a promise under oath w/ no intention of keeping it, or
when after promising on oath he does not keep it. Perjury is a grave lack of respect for the Lord. Pledging
oneself by oath to commit an evil deed is contrary to the holiness of the divine name.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus explained the 2 nd Commandment: “You have heard that it was said
to the men of old, ‘You shall not swear falsely but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.’ But I
say to you, Do not swear at all… Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’, anything more than this
comes from the evil one (Mt. 5:33-34). Jesus teaches that when referring to God in oath, His presence &
His truth must be honored. Discretion in calling upon God is allied w/ a respectful awareness of His
presence.

Following St. Paul, the tradition of the Church has understood Jesus’ words as not excluding oaths
made for grave & right reasons. An oath, that is an invocation of the divine name as a witness to truth,
cannot be taken unless in truth, in judgment & in justice.

The holiness of the divine name demands that we neither use it for trivial matters, nor take an oath w/c
on the basis of the circumstances could be interpreted as approval of an authority unjustly requiring it.
When an oath is required by illegitimate civil authorities, it may be refused. It must be refused when it is
required for purposes contrary to the dignity of persons or to ecclesial communion. Using the name of
God in vain is equivalent to refusing to follow and obey God.

The Christian Name

The sacrament of Baptism is conferred “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Spirit.” Thus, in Baptism the Lord’s name sanctifies man and the Christian receives his name in the
Church. This can be the name of a saint, that is of a disciple who has lived a life of exemplary fidelity to
the Lord. The patron saint provides a model of charity; we are assured of his/her intercession. The
“baptismal name” can also express a Christian mystery or Christian virtue. Parents, sponsors & the parish
priest are to see that a name is not given w/c is foreign to Christian sentiment.

God calls each one by name (Is. 43:1). Everyone’s name is sacred. The name is the icon of the person.
It stands for the person. It demands respect as a sign

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of the dignity of the one who bears it. The name one receives is a name for eternity. In the Kingdom, the
mysterious & unique character of each person marked w/ God’s name will shine forth in splendor.

It was believed that knowing the name of someone gave power over that person. Jesus played on that
common belief when expelling unclean spirits in the territory of the Gerasenes (Mk 5:9).

The Christian begins his day, his prayers & his activities w/ the Sign of the Cross: “In the name of the
Father…Amen.” It expresses the names of the Blessed Trinity and reminds him of the power of the
redeeming death of Jesus. The baptized person dedicates the day to the glory of God and calls on the
Savior’s grace w/c lets him act in the Spirit as a child of the Father. The sign of the cross strengthens us in
times of temptations & difficulties.

What the 2 nd Commandment enjoins positively then is the joy-filled praise of the Psalmist: “Praise you
servants of the Lord, praise the name of the Lord. Blessed be the name of the Lord both now & forever.
From the rising to the setting of the sun is the name of the Lord to be praised” (Ps 113:1-3). With Christ
our Lord we pray: “Father, glorify Your name” (Jn 12:28).

Lesson 4
Third Commandment: “Remember to keep holy the Lord’s Day.” The Sabbath Day

I. OBJECTIVES:

At the end of the lesson, you must be able:

 To explain what is meant by Sabbath day and the Lord’s day

 To define prayer and the purpose of praying
 To be faithful to worship God on the Lord’s day, Sunday
 To listen attentively to God’s voice and respond to it
 To participate actively in the Sunday celebration of the Eucharist

II. INTRODUCTION

Engage/Explore

 Activity: Make a running schedule of activities (w/ time duration) from morning till evening you
are usually doing in a Sunday.

Explain/Elaborate

The 3rd Commandment of the Decalogue recalls the holiness of the Sabbath. In speaking of the
Sabbath, Scripture recalls creation: “For in six days the Lord made heaven & earth, the sea, all that is in
them, & rested the seventh day; that is why the Lord has blessed the Sabbath day & made it
holy”(Ex20:11).

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Scripture also reveals in the Lord’s day a memorial of Israel’s liberation from bondage in Egypt: “You
shall remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt & the Lord your God brought you out
there… therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day” (Dt 5:15).

God entrusted the Sabbath to Israel to keep as a sign of the irrevocable Covenant. The Sabbath is for
the Lord, holy & set apart for the praise of God, His work of creation & His saving actions on behalf of
Israel.

God’s action is the model for human action. If God rested & was refreshed on 7th day, man too ought
to rest & should let others especially the poor be refreshed. The Sabbath brings everyday work to a halt &
provides a respite. It is a day of protest against the servitude of work & worship of money.

Although all four gospels record that Jesus faithfully observed the Sabbath (Mt 4:23), they also report
many incidents when He was accused of violating the Sabbath law. But Jesus never fails to respect the
holiness of this day. He gives this law its authentic & authoritative interpretation: “The Sabbath was made
for man, not man for the Sabbath” (Mk2:27). With compassion, Christ declares the Sabbath for doing
good rather than harm, for saving life rather than killing(Mk3:4).Sabbath is a day of the Lord of mercies
& day to honor God.

Easter: the New Sabbath

After Christ’s glorious Resurrection & Pentecostal enlightenment of the Holy Spirit, a whole new
dimension was added to the Sabbath. Because Jesus rose from the dead on Easter Sunday, the day after
Sabbath, Christians have always kept this day as the new Sabbath… Sunday is the Easter celebration. It is
a day when the presence of the risen Lord Jesus is celebrated especially in the Eucharist.

Vatican II provides a similar description of this historical shift: “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 7th day, which is appropriately called the Lord’s Day or Sunday (SC 106). This
means that for Christians, Sunday is also the coming of a new creation & of the final Sabbath-rest already
foretold in the creation account.

Two Reasons

The first reason for Sabbath rest relates to God’s creative action in Genesis. “In six days the Lord
made … but on 7th day He rested” (Ex 20:11). The work of creation reached its climax w/ creation of
human persons, made to continue God’s own activity in their creaturely way. But creation story does not
end there: the ultimate goal is the Sabbath – not creation in itself but fellowship w/ God the Creator.

The second reason is the great liberation from slavery in Egypt: “For remember that you too were
once slaves … your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath” (Dt 5:15). This reason clearly
emphasizes the Sabbath as: a) commemorating the day of liberation & b) its social dimension focusing
on the socially disadvantaged & oppressed – children, slaves, animals, foreigners.

Throughout history, these two reasons for the Sabbath commandment have sometimes been set against
each other. If the worship of God alone is stressed, then the Sabbath tends to become a day of Pharisaic
legalistic piety w/ its social humanitarian dimensions gravely restricted. On the other hand, if – as seems

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to be the more common case today – only the human social rest dimensions of the Sabbath are
emphasized, the holy day becomes simply a holiday for physical relaxation & enjoyment w/ only minimal
concern for any religious aspect.

But such polarization contradicts both biblical sources: the worship version is of the Creator God
precisely as radiating His love to children, slave, beast & foreigner while the humanitarian liberating rest
of Exodus is accomplished by Yahweh, the All-Holy. Thus, the two reasons for the Sabbath complement
each other and bind together the Two Tablets. The holiness of the Sabbath is to be recognized by setting
aside for worship & for rest. In both these aspects of the Sabbath, we open ourselves to God & to one
another.

Sunday Eucharist

In the centuries preceding Vatican II, the Lord’s Day or Sunday rest became more & more identified
w/ “going to Mass” and avoiding all “servile work.” The fuller significance of the Lord’s Day was
gradually lost. W/ today’s increasingly materialistic attitudes & secularization of culture, both these
practices have come under greater & greater attack.

Vatican II sought a renewal of spirit in Sunday observance by stressing both its re-creating & worship
dimensions. The Eucharist contributes substantially to both since it is essentially a community act of
worship, precisely in the form of a communal meal fellowship in the Lord. The Eucharist is prayer of
thanksgiving to God for life and for salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ in w/c union between God &
humankind is effectively signified. In calling us together around the Table of the Lord, it offers in a
unique way a foretaste of the “rest’ w/c completes God’s work of creation & of redemption.

The Church and the Lord’s Day

As members of the new People of God, we have the duty to worship together as a community so as to
express our unity as one people w/ Christ as head and to deepen our relationship w/ God. Therefore in
accordance w/ the 3rd Commandment, the Church decrees that Catholics should fulfill this duty by
actively participating in the Eucharist, sacrifice of New Law instituted by Christ.

PCPII stated that the importance of the Sunday Eucharist cannot be over-estimated and pleaded for
“Spirit-filled & fraternally warm Eucharistic celebrations that foster a vibrant experience of dynamic
fellowship in Christ & of encountering the Lord. Unfortunately, a considerable number of Filipino
Catholics cannot regularly participate in celebrating the Sunday Eucharist dueto lack of available priests
or distance from the place of celebration & the like. In many dioceses, priestless Sunday services have
been arranged as stop-gap measure until sufficient priests are available for pastoral work in the areas.

Observance of the Lord’s Day

Since Vatican II, the major efforts to raise the quality of Sunday worship have met w/considerable
success. However there has also a noticeable decline in Sunday Church attendance and in avoiding the
work that impedes Sunday rest. Renewal of celebrating the Lord’s Day through better understanding of
the essential meaning of the Commandment and of its proper motivation is an urgent priority for the
Church. As St. John XXIII wrote:

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God has a right to demand of man that he has to dedicate one day of the week to the proper & fitting
worship of the eternal Godhead… freed from material preoccupations. In addition, man has the right to
periodic rest… to renew bodily strength, enjoy a decent measure of recreation and to promote family
unity by making possible more frequent and harmonious contacts among family members. Thus religion,
morality and hygiene, all unite in proclaiming the law of periodic rest.

For today’s average Filipino Catholic, further clarification might be needed concerning the rest
enjoined by 3rd Commandment. Basically, the rest on the Lord’s day concerns more than psycho-physical
recreation. It has to do w/ St. Augustine’s famous words: Our hearts are restless till they rest in Thee.” It
means a rest in God’s presence. In the Letter to the Hebrews we read: “whoever enters into God’s rest,
rests from his own work as God did from His. Therefore let us strive to enter into that rest” (Heb 4:10-
11). As Christians we have to learn more about the deeper, properly Christian, meaning of both our work
and our recreation.

A proper Christian view of work and recreation can be sketched as an ethics of grace opposing three
particular modern attitudes: heightened anxiety, hyper activism and success orientation. Being over
anxious against all eventualities often ends in a perverted, desperate, enslaving effort for self-made
security and independence. When the rich old man in the Gospel thought he had everything, God said he
was a fool (Lk 12:21). Instead Christ taught: “Don’t worry about your livelihood, what you are to eat or
drink or use for clothing… Your heavenly Father knows all you need. Seek first His Kingship... All these
things will be given to you.”

Being active and industrious is a highly praised virtue these days, yet some people can become so task-
oriented that they lose all sense of proportion. Their own efforts become an idol for them. So too for those
for whom success and achievement becomes their only goal. They tend to judge everything even their
friends & neighbors uniquely in terms of usefulness & productivity.

All three attitudes fostered to some extent by modern industrialization & technology together form a
sort of ideology of performance. They correct the Filipino “Juan Tamad” characterization of laziness w/c
unfortunately still plagued many of our poor. But they do so at high price: introducing harsh impersonal,
self-centered attitudes especially among the youth.

In contrast, the 3rd Commandment prevents us from absolutizing our own achievements by preserving
the sense of God’s gracious presence, a reality beyond all our powers, yet forming the basis for our
dealing w/ our fellow persons.

-End of module 1-

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