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Sundays in Scripture

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Seventh Day Adventists (SDAs) believe that Christians shouldn’t worship on Sundays and that the Saturday Sabbath is still in effect. In recent weeks I’ve been having a discussion in a Seventh Day Adventist in response to my post Why do Christians worship on Sundays?  The exchange has been good and I think it’s well worth a read and I’d invite you to check it out.

Sunday

I haven’t had much interaction with SDAs before and I hope to do some posts looking at their more interesting doctrinal positions, of which there are quite a few. However, in preparation for this, today I would simply like to do a post where I catalogue all the places in the New Testament where Sunday is mentioned:

1. The Resurrection
All the Gospels record the Resurrection taking place on Sunday (Matthew 28:1-7; Mark 16:2, 9; Luke 24:1; John 20:1).

2. Resurrection Appearances
Jesus appears to His disciples on Sundays (John 20:19, John 20:26).

3. Pentecost
The original Pentecost took place on a Sunday (Lev. 23:16) and therefore so did Pentecost in the New Testament (Acts 2:1). On this day the first sermon is preached, three thousand convert and are baptized.

4. Preaching and celebrating the Eucharist
In Paul’s travels, it is recorded that the Christian community came together to hear Paul preach and break bread (Acts 20:7).

5. Gathered collections
Paul instructed the Corinthians to gather their charitable donations on Sunday (1 Corinthians 16:2).

6. Vision of Heavenly Worship
Jesus gave the apostle John the vision of Revelation on the first day of the week (Revelation 1:10).

Non-Catholics receiving Communion?

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Reception of the Holy Eucharist has recently been the subject of scrutiny in the media, prompted by some of the discussions taking place in the “Synod on the Family”. In my own life, Holy Communion was also the subject of a recent incident concerning a friend of mine.

You see, a friend recently went to a Catholic conference together with a Protestant. Being a Catholic event, there was, of course, the celebration of the Eucharist. When time for Mass came, the non-Catholic was upset that she couldn’t go up to receive the Eucharist. She couldn’t do this because, under ordinary circumstances, the Catholic Church does not allow non-Catholics to receive Holy Communion.

“…members of those churches with whom we are not yet fully united are ordinarily not admitted to Communion”
– United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, “Guidelines For communion”

In this post I would like to provide a summary of what I say when I’m asked why it is that the Catholic Church doesn’t allow anyone to receive Holy Communion (the Eastern Orthodox Churches have similar rules for similar reasons). As usual, this won’t be an exhaustive theological explanation, simply a rough outline of the kind of thing I personally say when I’m asked to explain this particular Catholic teaching.

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Fishers of men

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Recently, a clerical friend of mine was officially installed at a parish here in San Diego. It called to mind the invitation of Jesus to His Apostles:

“Follow me and I will make you become fishers of men” – Mark 1:17

I remember being in primary school and, upon hearing the phrase “fishers of men”, had fantastical pictures in my head of St. Peter and Andrew dragging ashore nets full of squirming bodies of fully-grown men. What can I say? I had a vivid imagination as a child.

Fishers-of-Men

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Early Church and Receiving Communion

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There’s a lot of discussion online at the moment about the conditions under which people may or may not receive communion. I have another post in draft on this subject, but I wanted to do a quick post outlining some of the earliest Church testimony on this subject.

In the First Century, the Didache teaches the following:

“On the Lord’s day, gather yourselves together and break bread, give thanks, but first confess your sins so that your sacrifice may be pure. However, let no one who is at odds with his brother come together with you, until he has reconciled, so that your sacrifice may not be profaned.” – Didache (Chapter 14)

So here we see that unrepentant sin or in a state of disunity cannot receive communion. We find Justin Martyr in the Second Century saying something very similar:

“This food we call Eukaristia [the Eucharist], and no one is allowed to partake but he who believes that our doctrines are true, who has been washed with the washing for the remission of sins and rebirth, and who is living as Christ has enjoined” – St. Justin Martyr, First Apology (Chapter 66)

Here we find the three basic conditions to receiving communion: baptized, assent to Church doctrine and right living.

Eucharist

I’ve got a more substantial post in the works on the subject of interdenominational communion which I’ll publish next week…

Quick Apology: Losing Authority

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Today’s “Quick Apology” comes from a conversation a friend of mine recently had with a Reformed Protestant. It’s actually a bit of a long response for a “Quick” apology, but oh well…

Objection

“I’ll concede that the case for the historical church being the Catholic church is very strong. However, the chosen people (the Israelites) were consistently disobeying God throughout history and eventually ended up crucifying Christ. Throughout history the chosen people abandoned God. What makes you think that the Catholic Church hasn’t done this or won’t do this?”

Response

Here, the Protestant is admitting to many of the claims of the Catholic Church, but appears to be challenging the Church’s continued status as Christ’s Church, as well as calling into question her continued authority.

It must first obviously be admitted that sinners are found in the Catholic Church. After all, why else do you think I’m allowed membership?!. However, a few points should be made…

Old Testament

Israel certainly sinned over the course of Salvation History. However, would it mean that because of this, it would be better for a Jew or Gentile to abandon God’s people and “go it alone”? Of course not! If one left Judaism, thinking that this couldn’t possibly be the true religion due to the hypocrisy of some of their rulers and many its followers, then one would be making a huge mistake!

As Saint Paul said, “…to them belong the sonship, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; to them belong the patriarchs“ (Romans 9:4-5). The Lord had given to Israel many wonderful gifts for the sake of salvation. It would be crazy to reject these gifts and walk away!

However, we actually have an example in the Old Testament of when some members of Israel did just that. After King Solomon’s death, his son ascended to the throne (1 Kings 12) who was a complete tyrant. The northern tribes refused to follow him and this resulted in the division of the Kingdom: the Kingdom of Israel in the north and the Kingdom of Judea in the south. This separatist movement received the condemnation of the prophets. Not only had they abandoned their rightful king, they had cut themselves off from the priesthood, the Temple and the sacrifices.

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