The text of the Genesis He continues: "And God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it he rested from all the work that God had done when he created". Thus God sanctified rest, as Jesus would do with work (thirty years in Joseph's workshop), and also with rest, when he was weary from the road.
The undersigned is a journalist, not an expert in Sacred Scripture, nor in vacation arts, nor in psychology. Here are just a few points that can help us to rest, in some of the meanings of the term that the Royal Spanish Academy. These are:
1. To cease in work, to repair the forces with stillness.
2. To have some relief from worries.
3. To relieve oneself, to have relief or consolation by communicating to a friend or trusted person one's woes or hardships.
4. Rest, sleep.
5. Said of a person: to be calm and careless because he or she has confidence in something or someone.
6. To relieve someone at work, to help someone at work.
There are more meanings of the term "rest", but these are enough for a quick reflection from a Christian perspective, which anyone can do.
1. Ceasing to work, restoring strength through quietness.
This is the first meaning. It points out the Catechism of Catholic Doctrine that "just as God 'ceased on the seventh day from all the work that he had done' (Gn 2:2), so too human life follows a rhythm of work and rest. The institution of the Lord's Day helps everyone to enjoy sufficient time of rest and solace to enable them to cultivate their family, cultural, social and religious life" (n. 2184).
2. To have some relief from worries
St. Matthew writes: "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble of heart, and you will find your rest. For my yoke is easy to bear and my burden is light".
In the well-known fragment of abandonment to Providence, St. Luke records. "And he said to his disciples, 'Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; nor about the body, what you will put on; for life is more than food, and the body more than clothing. Look at the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor barn, and God feeds them; how much more valuable are you than the birds! Who among you, by dint of being overburdened, can add one hour to the time of his life? Therefore, if you cannot do the least, why fret about the rest?"
3. To relieve oneself, to communicate to a friend evils or hardships.
Pope Francis: "God, in the Decalogue, shows another light of what rest is, which is 'contemplation and praise'. "To rest as an escape from reality, the Decalogue opposes rest as a blessing of reality," he added in a General Audience in 2018.
"For us Christians, the Lord's Day is Sunday, and in the Eucharist, which means 'to give thanks,' we find the culmination of that day of contemplation and blessing, in which we welcome reality and praise the Lord for the gift of life, thanking him for his mercy and for all the good things he grants us." Resting in the Lord is a doctrine established by spiritual authors. Francisco on several occasions recalled the words of the Psalm: "My soul rests in God alone", and the need to cultivate silence and prayer.
In the same catechesis, the Pope said that "rest is also a propitious moment for reconciliation, to confront difficulties without escaping from them, to find the peace and serenity of those who know how to value the good things they have, even in the bed of pain or poverty".
4. Rest, sleep
Numerous physicians, psychiatrists and psychologists have argued the beneficial properties of sleep, in a society where the time needed for sleep is often cut back. They have also done so with the support of moderate exercise, according to age and with medical indication or supervision.
5. To be calm and careless because we trust something or someone.
This issue has been mentioned in points 2 and 3 above. Perhaps one can add the convenience of cultivating friendshipThis is the kind of love that is given "in two directions and that desires every good for the other person, love that produces union and happiness", as St. John Paul II wrote, and on which Pope Francis meditated in the Apostolic Exhortation Christus vivit and in their catechesis.
6. Relieving someone at work, helping another person
Caring for others, especially the most needy, the poor, the elderly and the sick, in addition to fulfilling the mandate of charity, is always beneficial to the spirit, and good proof of this are the testimonies of the many people who give themselves to others.
