Sunday is supposed to be a day of rest, just as on Friday we are supposed to abstain from meat or make some other sacrifice. As with all things in the Church, they are designed for our benefit. Work and chores expand to the time we give them, and they will never be done. Friday is an ordinary day in which we look forward to the weekend, but a small reminder that our God chose to give up everything for us isn’t such a bad thing. It helps us to remember how loved and valued we are, who we are, and whose we are.

Perhaps one of the reasons we don’t observe the sabbath, why we work or do chores on Sunday, is just because we ran out of time during the week. It’s easy to design a perfect week in our heads, allocating enough time for each task so that Sunday is protected. But there is no perfect week. There are changes, doctor’s appointments, haircuts, dog grooming, and swimming lessons that come and go and that take away big chunks of time. Unprotected, those uncompleted tasks just get shifted to Sunday.

I think the deeper truth is that we don’t know what to do when we give ourselves permission to not work. Suddenly, with a six-hour time block between Mass and dinner, how should we fill those hours? Funny as it seems, that much optionality, in a world in which we are constantly guided by constraints, can feel scary. A good option, in the vast openness of a Sunday afternoon with no obligations, is play.

There came a point in our lives when we stopped playing. Play is the work of children, but we never outgrow our need for play. It can look as it used to look, or it can look like play for adults. That means that going to LEGO store and picking out a set to build with your kids qualifies. That means flying your drone qualifies. So does going for a leisurely walk, a family bike ride, or playing a board game are all ideal ways to spend a Sunday.

God’s example for us is meant to model how to life live well. God was not exhausted at the end of the creation allegory; God has infinite energy and does not need a break. He rested because we need a break, and because it is right and proper to enjoy the created world.

Protecting our Sunday’s from the creep of work and chores is not just a noble goal, but a practical reality we should strive for. Our children do require much of our time, energy, and attention during the week, but our interactions with them shouldn’t be confined to homework, projects, and picking up. We should find them in the rejuvenating activity of play.

We never outgrow our need for play. What we really need is the permission to rest on Sunday and the invitation from our children to step away from our responsibilities, even just for a few hours, and to spend that time, instead, at play.