晨读英语美文 What Happened to Sunday?

What Happened to Sunday?

[00:12.08]Today our life and work

[00:14.97] rarely feel light, pleasant or healing. 

[00:17.44]Instead, the whole experience of being alive 

[00:20.62]begins to melt into one enormous obligation. 

[00:23.35]It becomes the standard greeting everywhere: 

[00:26.63]I am so busy.

[00:28.71]We say this to one another 

[00:31.34]with no small degree of pride. 

[00:32.97]The busier we are, the more important 

[00:36.47]we seem to ourselves and, 

[00:38.00]we imagine, to others. 

[00:39.65]To be unavailable to our friends and family, 

[00:42.27]to be unable to find time for the sunset, 

[00:44.89]to whiz through our obligations 

[00:47.81]without time for a single mindful breath  

[00:50.48]this has become the model of a successful life.

[00:54.08]Because we do not rest, we lose our way. 

[00:57.80]We lose the nourishment that gives us help. 

[01:01.30]We miss the quiet that gives us wisdom. 

[01:04.69]Poisoned by the belief that good things 

[01:07.70]come only through tireless effort, 

[01:09.94]we never truly rest.

[01:11.80]This is not the world we dreamed of when we were young. 

[01:16.18]How did we get so terribly rushed in a world 

[01:20.22]saturated with work and responsibility, 

[01:22.30]yet somehow bereft of joy and delight?

[01:25.48]We have forgotten the Sabbath. 

[01:28.65]Sabbath is the time to enjoy 

[01:31.59]and celebrate what is beautiful and good  

[01:33.78]time to light candles, sing songs, worship, tell stories, 

[01:39.36]bless our children and loved ones,

[01:42.27] give thanks, share meals, nap, and walk. 

[01:46.69]It is time to be nourished and refreshed 

[01:51.05]as we let our work, our chores 

[01:53.85]and our important projects lie fallow, 

[01:56.32]trusting that there are larger forces at work 

[01:59.27]taking care of the world when we are at rest.

[02:02.44]Sabbath is more than the absence of work. 

[02:07.14]Many of us, in our desperate drive to be successful 

[02:10.86]and care for our many responsibilities feel terrible guilt 

[02:14.69]when we take time to rest. 

[02:16.11]But the Sabbath has proven its wisdom over the ages. 

[02:19.94]Many of us still recall when, not long ago, 

[02:25.30]shops and offices were closed on Sundays. 

[02:27.70]Those quiet Sunday afternoons 

[02:30.98]are embedded in our cultural memory.