Please read the text before the commentary.
Holiness is an important theme in the Bible. Land is holy, as God told Moses at the burning bush (Exodus 3:4). Time is also holy. The sabbath is holy and marks out one-seventh of each week as holy. Most of the other holy times occur in the spring or fall, at planting and at harvest. The beginnings and the endings of time are holy and, therefore, all time is holy.
We celebrate our festivals throughout the year with special ceremonies and gatherings. We parade on the Fourth of July. We visit cemeteries on Memorial Day. We come home on Thanksgiving. We phone parents on Mothers’ Day.
Do we “have to celebrate” these days? This is not to answer the bored adolescent’s cry of “I don’t wanna have to do anything” Our celebrations mark us as members of our groups. We exercise citizenship and become more citizen by taking part in holidays. We share the attitude of the people when we celebrate special holidays.
Minority groups, seeking greater recognition, organize Pride Parades, Cancer Awareness Days, Poultry Days, and similar events to draw attention of people’s existence and needs.
Celebrating these “sacred times” ties us to the sacredness of the times celebrated. They mark us and engage us more deeply into the life of the community.
We have our sacred religious times. Christmas and Easter are well-known religious feasts. We mark Sunday as a special weekly celebration of the sacred in our lives. Celebrating these times can energize our commitment and faith in the God who gives us these sacred times. These are sacred times and we are sacred people celebrating sacred times.