Here’s what I was told. In the beginning of the Church, the Christians were still Jews and worshiped in the Temple on the Sabbath, then met together on the Lord’s Day, Sunday, for what we would call the Mass. They were looked on as a sect of Judaism, as were the Essenes. At some point, early on, they were expelled from the Temple because they believed and taught that Jesus was the Messiah. Following thier expulsion, they then worshiped on Sunday instead of the Sabbath.
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Peace,
Linda
You are pretty well on track here Linda, The early Christians were hated and persecuted because they preached Jesus Christ, hence they were thrown out and they fled. As Christianity spread throughout the roman empire the pagans of rome associated the Christians with the jews (whom the romans absolutely hated ) because the jews were the only ones who kept the seventh day Sabbath as instructed in scripture. So rome started persecuting christians in a large part due to association to the jews because of the Sabbath. In essence the tremendous persecutions by the roman empire eventually led to concessions and compromise of beliefs. Sunday worship has been thoroughly established as pagan in origin. As far back as the Chaldean and Egyptian empires. The first “official” keeping of sunday in the early church I have found started coming into being about 313 A.D with the emporer constantine who mixed christianity with paganism in an effort to gain popularity with both sides in his kingdom. We see the response of the church to the persecution of the recent past and pressure from Constantine to make concessions in the council of Laodecea in A.D 364 The twenty ninth canon of that council reads as follows .
CANON XXIX.
“CHRISTIANS must not judaize by resting on the Sabbath, but must work on that day, rather honouring the Lord’s Day; and, if they can, resting then as Christians. But if any shall be found to be judaizers, let them be anathema from Christ.”
Note the reference to being “judaizers” if they kept the seventh day Sabbath
"Peter Geiermann, C.S.S.R., The Converts Catechism of Catholic Doctrine Third Edition"1). Question: Which is the Sabbath day? "Answer: Saturday is the Sabbath day. 2). "Question: Why do we observe Sunday instead of Saturday?"Answer. “We observe Sunday instead of Saturday because the Catholic Church in the Council of Laodicea, transferred the solemnity from Saturday to Sunday.”
As we see here The church openly admits that there is not a single piece of evidence in scripture from Christ or the apostles.
"The Catholic Cardinal Gibbons, in Faith of Our Fathers, pg. 111, said, "You may read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and you will not find a single line authorizing the sanctification of Sunday. The Scriptures enforce the religious observance of Saturday, a day which we (The Roman Catholic Church) never sanctify.
The Catholic Mirror (a publication by Cardinal Gibbons) Sept. 2, 1893- “…the Redeemer, during His mortal life, never kept any other day than Saturday.”
I have seen alot of misapplication of a particular scripture on this subject.
“Joh 20:19 Now when it was late the same day, the first of the week, and the doors were shut, where the disciples were gathered together, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst and said to them: Peace be to you.” Douay Rheims 1899
To use this verse as a basis saying they were observing Sabbath goes against alot of church writings and doctrine as we have seen. There is no basis whatsoever in this verse for sunday worship. The verse is self explanatory as to why they were gathered together on saturday night as we call it now, it was because they were afraid of the jews who had just crucified Christ. God bless!
