---
title: "Why should we keep the Lord's Day holy?"
url: "https://seekabove.com/answers/what-is-the-third-commandment"
description: "The Third Commandment — “remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy” — calls us to set aside a day for God and for rest. For Christians this is Sunday, the day of Christ’s resurrection: a day to worsh…"
published: "2026-06-06"
updated: "2026-06-10"
category: "Christian Life"
scripture: ["Exodus 20:8-10", "Genesis 2:2-3", "Mark 2:27-28", "Deuteronomy 5:15", "Hebrews 10:25"]
catechism: "CCC 2168, 2172, 2174–2176, 2180–2181, 2184–2186, 2188"
---

# Why should we keep the Lord's Day holy?

## Short answer

The Third Commandment — "remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy" — calls us to set
aside a day for God and for rest. For Christians this is Sunday, the day of Christ's
resurrection: a day to worship God (above all at Mass) and to step off the treadmill of
work for genuine rest, family, and refreshment. It's less a restriction than a gift.

## Full explanation

This commandment is rooted in the very rhythm of creation: God "rested" on the seventh
day, and built a pattern of work and rest into the world. The Sabbath was God's gift to a
people who had been slaves in Egypt, worked without pause — a weekly declaration that
they were no longer slaves, that their worth wasn't measured only by output, and that the
world keeps turning even when they stop. To keep the day holy is to trust God enough to
rest.

For Christians, the day shifts to **Sunday**, "the Lord's Day," because that's when Jesus
rose from the dead — the new creation breaking in. Sunday doesn't simply rename the
Sabbath; the Church teaches that the Lord's Day fulfils and replaces it. It is the
original Christian feast, gathering two great strands: **worship** and **rest**.

**Worship** is central. For Catholics, the heart of keeping Sunday holy is the Mass —
which is why the Church teaches that attending Sunday Mass is a serious obligation, not
because God needs our attendance, but because we need the encounter. The Church is
candid about the weight of this: to skip Sunday Mass deliberately, without a serious
reason, is a grave sin — not a minor lapse. And beyond any single Sunday, to neglect
the worship of God week after week is to let the most important
relationship of our lives quietly starve. (Genuine impediments — illness, caring for
someone, essential work — are understood and excuse the obligation.)

**Rest** is the other half, and our culture badly needs it. The commandment asks us to
refrain from unnecessary work and the grind of business so we have space for God, for
family and friends, for the poor and lonely, for the body's renewal, and for the simple
goodness of unhurried time. In a world that treats busyness as a virtue and rest as
laziness, deliberately guarding one day is countercultural and humanising.

So the Third Commandment isn't a killjoy rule against doing things on Sunday. It's a
weekly invitation to remember who you are: not a machine, but a beloved child of God, made
for worship and for rest.

## Why this matters

Without a built-in pause, life collapses into unending work and distraction, and God gets
crowded out. The Sabbath principle protects two things our culture is starving for: a
living relationship with God, and genuine rest. A person who keeps a real day for God and
others tends to be more human, more grounded, and less enslaved to productivity than one
who never stops.

## Common misunderstanding

One misunderstanding treats Sunday Mass as an arbitrary box to tick under threat. It's
better understood as the lifeline the day is built around — the encounter that feeds
everything else. The opposite misunderstanding reduces the commandment to "just don't work
on Sunday," forgetting the worship at its heart, or to "go to Mass" while ignoring the call
to genuine rest and works of mercy.

## Scripture connections

- **Exodus 20:8-10** — "remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy."
- **Genesis 2:2-3** — God rests on the seventh day and makes it holy, the pattern behind
  the commandment.
- **Mark 2:27-28** — "the sabbath was made for humankind, not humankind for the sabbath";
  it's a gift, and Jesus is its Lord.
- **Deuteronomy 5:15** — the Sabbath tied to liberation from slavery in Egypt.
- **Hebrews 10:25** — do not neglect "to meet together," the call to communal worship.

## Church teaching references

- CCC 2168, 2172, 2174, 2175, 2176, 2180, 2181, 2184, 2185, 2186, 2188
- The Catechism treats the Third Commandment as the call to keep the Lord's Day holy
  through participation in the Eucharist and through rest.

## Reflection question

What would it take to reclaim one genuine day a week for God, rest, and the people you
love — and what keeps crowding it out?