Sundays Changing in America

There was a time in America when Sunday was unique among the days of the week: just about everything was closed, people attended church services, and the rest of life simply slowed down to a relaxing crawl for a few hours. Not anymore, though. Today Sunday is pretty much like every other day.

According to the Holland Sentinel:

Across the nation, laws governing Sunday conduct -- some dating to the 17th century -- have fallen. In some places, like South Carolina, the changes created a crazy-quilt patchwork that allows some stores to open at some hours while others can't. In Maine, it wasn't until 1990 that voters repealed a law barring Sunday shopping at supermarkets and department stores. In Texas, as late as 1985, everything from kitchenware to air conditioners to curtains couldn't be sold on two consecutive weekend days -- a move designed to outlaw them on Sunday. These days, it's unimaginable to many Americans, particularly younger ones: A mall closed on Sunday? The supermarket unavailable?

Even laws governing Sunday alcohol, though they remain on some states' books, are falling away. Today, 31 states permit Sunday sales of liquor, according to the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States. In the past two years, nine states initiated Sunday sales -- including Massachusetts, where some of the earliest moral-conduct laws were passed. New Jersey-based Commerce Bank -- a bank! -- has focused an entire promotional campaign around doing business on Sundays.

What’s going on? Is this a sign of anti-religious secularism in America? No, actually, it’s a consequence of people’s experience of time itself changing. It used to be that there were regular rhythms in how people experienced the passage of time over the course of a day, a week, a month, and even over an entire year. The passage of time was marked by certain boundaries and events that created structure to our time — but not anymore.

"We've erased a lot of the distinctions between night and day, between weekday and weekend," says Susan Orlean, author of "Saturday Night in America," a 1990 book. "Our notions of time and space are collapsing." ... "Maybe maintaining the idea of time having some relevance may actually become more meaningful," Orlean says. "I'm not sure that people really want to live in a universe in which there's no day and night, no week and weekend. I don't know that that gives us anything."

Are these changes good or bad? I’m not sure. I tend to agree with Orlean that the structuring of how we experience the passage of time can also help give time more meaning. Instead of one long blur we have special times of the day, of the week, of the month, and of the year to do particular things or to celebrate particular events. Reserving Sundays for something unique creates a certain structure and rhythm to the week; losing that and erasing any distinctions between one day and the next may not be such a good idea.

Read More:

• Religion 101
• Theism 101
• Does God Exist?