THE BISHOP of Chester says Sunday is no longer special in the latest edition of Diocesan News.

Rt Rev Dr Peter Forster believes society and family life in particular has lost out because of the commercialisation of Sundays since trading laws were relaxed in 1994.

And he encourages people to use the August holiday period as an opportunity to stand back and reflect.

He writes: “During my years as bishop I have seen the effects of the deregulation of Sunday, and the effective abandonment of trading restrictions.

“No doubt for many people this feels like a gain, but I sense that Sunday has disappeared into the all-too-human-centred greyness of the rest of the week. It isn’t only religiously inclined people who have lost out, but society as a whole, and especially family life.

“As a society, we are too busy: obsessed with information, but lacking wisdom. Let the holiday atmosphere of August help us all to relax, stand back from the hurly-burly of things, and focus our thoughts upon our creator and redeemer.

“After all, he began it all, with the original Sabbath Rest, on the seventh day of creation, when he finished his work of creation and beheld it to be ‘very good’. May our holidays, and holy days, train our eyes to see the goodness of God in the world.”

The bishop mused that August used to be the time when everybody took holidays, and for those with school age children it still is.

“Others now take more frequent holidays, at any time of the year,” he added.

The bishop explained that the word ‘holiday’ is a contraction of ‘holy day’, and many public holidays still derive from the Christian year.

“Indeed, the whole idea of a special day of rest comes from the Jewish practice of the Sabbath, which Christians turned into Sunday – a special weekly celebration of the resurrection,” he added.