Sunday! Sunday! Sunday!

[RND]

Place all your Sunday legislation news here....


Protection of the work-free Sunday:
MEPs launch Written Declaration


The Secretariat of COMECE, the Protestant Church in Germany (EKD) and the Church of England welcome the initiative of several Members of the European Parliament, to ask the House to decide on a Written Declaration “on the protection of a work-free Sunday as an essential pillar of the European Social Model and as part of the European cultural heritage”. Such a declaration would constitute an important commitment to a “Social Europe”. It is now important to find the majority necessary for this cross-party resolution, which has been launched by five parliamentarians – from the political groups of EPP, PSE, ALDE and UEN – on 2 February 2009.


The economic and financial crises have made us more aware of the fact that not all aspects of life can be subject to market forces. Unrestrained consumption is neither a model for a sustainable economy, nor a healthy concept for human development. Men and women, who work on Sundays, are put at a disadvantage in their social relationships: Their family life, personal development and even health are verifiably affected.

A part of the European cultural heritage of longstanding tradition and high value, the work-free Sunday is a decisive factor in balancing work and family life. It is of fundamental importance for family relations, but also for social and cultural life to safeguard one of the few remaining times which can be shared by children and their parents. According to EU law, Sunday is the weekly rest day for children and adolescents (1). That is why respect for Sunday rest has the potential to be a pillar of the European social model.

In recent years, the protection of Sunday has been eroded in many Member States, with the purpose of increasing production and consumption. Workers have experienced fragmentation of their private lives, while small and medium-sized enterprises, which cannot afford uninterrupted opening hours have lost ground in the market place. Accordingly this declaration now introduced into parliament calls on the Member States and on the EU institutions to “protect Sunday, as a weekly rest day, in forthcoming national and EU working-time legislation in order to enhance the protection of workers' health and the reconciliation of work and family life”.

In order to be adopted, it is now necessary for the Written Declaration to be signed by a majority (394) of MEPs before 7 May 2009.

 

[RND]

A History Of Sunday

What Makes Sundays So Special? Charles Osgood Takes An In-Depth Look

Feb. 1, 2009

(CBS) Whether you're planning your Sunday brunch, taking a Sunday drive, or watching Sunday Morning, chances are you have your own Sunday ritual. It's the first day of the week, and for many, it's their favorite day.

"I don't think Sunday will ever be like every other day of the week. It's a special day. And it will remain a special day," says author Stephen Miller.

For Miller, the best thing about Sunday is that it is a day of rest. "That it's a day when you don't have to do things, when you can just lie around, see people if you want, or not see people."

And seeing people is a Sunday activity that Americans enjoy. According to a recent survey by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 40 percent of us socialize on Sundays, but twice as many - eight out of ten - sit back and watch TV, an average of four hours. And then there's church: one in four attends religious services. And about that same number goes shopping.

But when Sunday Morning first went on the air in 1979, in many parts of the country it was impossible to shop on Sundays: Stores were required to be closed, says Stephen Miller, who's written a book on the subject: "The Peculiar Life of Sundays"(Harvard University Press).

Americans once had a very narrow choice of permissible Sunday activities: "There were so many arguments in the United States, especially in the 19th century," Miller said. "Sunday legislation was the second-most debated subject after slavery, because there were different opinions about what you could or couldn't do on Sunday."

Those opinions began with the Puritans, who settled in New England in the 1630s. They called it "Strict Sunday Observance." Sunday was a day for church-going, and "Blue Laws" made almost everything else illegal.

"There were Connecticut blue laws in the 18th century, which said that you could not kiss your baby. You could not tell a joke. There was absolutely no frivolity on Sunday. And you could not play an instrument," Miller says.

Church organs and hymns aside, music was taboo on Sundays. "There was a French soldier stationed in Boston, and during the Revolutionary War he started playing the flute. He was arrested. No flute-playing on the Sabbath!" Miller laughed.

Some blue laws still exist today, mostly to regulate alcohol sales. But Miller says Americans have come a long way from the age of "strict observance."

"Gradually, in the 20th century, all the things that we associate with Sunday now started. So, there's the Sunday drive, the Sunday dinner, Sunday sports. And the Sunday paper," Miller says. "The Sunday paper with the comics and the crosswords became a major American phenomenon."

"We continue to relax in front of the Sunday newspaper. One hundred and fifteen million people in America still read a Sunday newspaper. In fact, readership was up last year from the year before," says Janice Kaplan, the editor of Parade Magazine.

For almost 70 years, it's been a Sunday institution, now appearing in more than 450 Sunday newspapers across the country, with a parade of covers to show for it. Parade, says Kaplan, would not be Parade on any other day of the week.

 

[Stryder06]

Yeah, it's so real that it isn't even funny. God is soon to retrun and things are going to happen just as He outlined them through His prophets. Of if only those who walk in darkness would forsake their ways and return to God.

 

[BobRyan]

There is a counter force to Sunday in both Europe and the U.S and that is evolutionism that is creating more and more agnostics and atheists. The EU has gone to a "post-Christian Age" according to many historians and the U.S is fast following in their footsteps. Even the Pope has complained that the churches are almost completely empty on Sunday.

The other force that is gaining ground against Sunday is the rise of Islamic and Budhist groups in Europe and the U.S. They are among those groups who have little value for Sunday as a day of religious observance but would welcome it as a weekly holiday (possibly).

However to get governments to "enFORCE" a Sunday restriction against businesses is going to take something a bit more compelling than cultural nostalgia as the EU will soon find out.

They must either show a compelling financial gain in shutting down businesses or they need to show some other compelling argument for issuing fines against business who would otherwise have every financial incentive to be open on that day.

in Christ,

Bob

 

[RND]

They must either show a compelling financial gain in shutting down businesses or they need to show some other compelling argument for issuing fines against business who would otherwise have every financial incentive to be open on that day.

Bob, I see this as something that is quite possible in light of today's worldwide economic conditions. The "Mother Church" as needs that must be fed. What better way to get folks back into church than through an economic necessity?

 

[Idol Breaker]

What many don't realize is that what now affect the EU now affect the US. I've read their trade agreement policies and that flatly state that any entity the signs a trade agreement with them MUST abide by their labor laws, therefore, if a "SUNDAY" business closure law were past in the EU for us to trade with them the US would have to comply and pass one as well. The world is no longer seperate bits and pieces and the Globalists are making sure it isn't.