January (Web-only) 2004

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Lauren Winner is on a wonderful spiritual journey and is kind enough to write about it for others to go along for the ride. In Girl Meets God she navigated readers through her sojourn from Judaism to Christianity. And in her newest book, Mudhouse Sabbath, she discusses the Jewish traditions she misses.

What have you found useful as you start re-thinking the Sabbath as a Christian?

I've reflected on what I understand is the two over-arching themes of Sabbath law in Judaism. One of those is the general command not to work on the Sabbath, and the other is the general command to be joyful. So I tried to reflect, in both my family and community, on ways that I could undertake both of those two over-arching principles.

One way is that I've stopped shopping. That was something I only discerned to be not very in keeping with the spirit of the Sabbath and resting, not interfering with creation. One of the other things I have found helpful is that I try not to check my email or use my cell phone on the Sabbath, which sounds like a small thing. But those are implements that connect us to our work and they put me in this state of very low-grade, constant tension that someone is trying to get a hold of me. So I simply try not to check email or use my cell phone on Sabbath.

Now obviously, there are exceptions to all of these rules. My mother was quite ill last fall, and if there was a Sunday and she needed me to go to the grocery store and purchase some Ensure for her, obviously I'm not going to respond to that by saying, "I'm sorry, it's the Sabbath."

You refer to eating kosher as eating attentively. Talk a bit about what you're finding is helpful, as a Christian, as you think about the idea of kosher eating.

One of the things I realized ...