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The speed of joy is:

Dynamic.

Natural.

Timeless.

Unhurried.

Welcome back to Best Advent Ever. When I was writing <em>Slowing Down to the Speed of Joy</em>, I thought, in the end, I would give you a list of 20, 30. I'd pick a good number, 21, 25, different ways to slow down to the speed of joy. But then as I worked on the book and reflected more upon it, I started to ask myself, if I could only recommend one thing, what would the one thing be? I started to think, people are busy, and we're talking about the toxicity of busy, and people have too many options, and that's complicated and confusing.

What if I could give you one thing that would guarantee if you did this one thing, and you did it well, and you became excellent at this one thing, that it would all but guarantee that you would slow down to the speed of joy. And so here's your one thing. Sunday is the one thing. I promised you one very specific form of leisure that would change your life. Sunday is it. The wisdom of the Sabbath will teach you how to slow down to the speed of joy. It's the one thing that will help you to restore your capacity for leisure and lead you to flourish like never before.

Sunday will create margin to love like never before, and carry out the great human mandate to love God and neighbor wholeheartedly. Sunday is the one thing from which so many other good things will flow. Goodness you cannot imagine yet will flow from authentically embracing Sundays. That's the one thing. Sunday will create margin to love like never before. Sunday will create margin to love like never before and help you live the great mandate to love God and neighbor. When I was researching the Sabbath, reading about the Sabbath, researching the Sabbath, I found this thing that would blow your mind. I started asking the question, what happened to Sunday?

Did you know it was illegal to disturb the Sabbath in the United States? Here's an excerpt from a bill for punishing disturbers of religious worship and Sabbath breakers from June 18, 1779. If any person on Sunday shall himself be found laboring at his own, or any other trade, or calling, or shall employ his apprentices, servants, or slaves in labor, or other business, except it be in the ordinary household offices of daily necessity, or other work of necessity, or charity, he shall forfeit the sum of 10 shillings for every such offense, deeming every apprentice, servant, or slave so employed, and every day he shall be so employed as constituting a distinct offense. Think about that for a moment. At one point in our history, this great nation, the Sabbath, your Sabbath, my Sabbath, our Sabbath, was clearly defended and preserved. What happened? Who stole the Sabbath? And of course, the sad thing is—the sad truth is, we stole it from ourselves. We traded it for trinkets. And in trading it for trinkets, we stole this glorious gift, this weakly sabbatical designed to restore your heart and your mind and your soul, designed to create margin in your life, to enrich your relationships.

We gave it away. We traded it for trinkets. We stole it from ourselves, and it's time to get it back. We're often tempted to reject the simple. "It couldn't be that simple," we tell ourselves, but it is. Think about it like this. Have you ever tried it? Have you ever really set Sundays as a day of rest? Try it. Test it. Prove it to yourself one way or another. Set Sunday aside in the way we are about to discuss for one whole month. After just four Sundays, I think you will find that you see yourself differently. You're more engaged in your relationships. The other people in your life love being with you on Sundays. You have a healthier perspective of what matters most in life. And you will be beginning to flourish. It's time to take back our Sundays. It's time to take back the gift of the Sabbath. How? One Sunday at a time.

Here's something else that'll blow your mind. In the past 30 years, 50 million American adults have left the Catholic Church, have stopped practicing their faith. But millions of them will come back to church just on Christmas Day. Just on Christmas Day. They've disengaged from their faith for whatever reason, but on Christmas Day, we have an opportunity. Question is, will we take that opportunity or waste that opportunity? Let me ask you if, for $2, you could re-engage a disengaged Catholic, would you spend that $2? $2 a copy, Slowing Down to the Speed of Joy, or The Forgotten Way, or The Seven Pillars of Catholic Spirituality, this Christmas. Pick a book, get a bunch of them, give them to people who come to church on Christmas. As a gift to those who are in the pews every Sunday, inspire them more in their faith, and as an attempt to win back the millions of Catholics who stopped practicing their faith in the United States over the past 30 years. God bless you. Have a great day. Be bold. Be Catholic.

Thank you, Ambassadors. You are changing the world. See you tomorrow.

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Have a great day. Have a great day. 

Bye-bye.

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Have a great day.

Come on.

[inaudible].

Have a great day.

Have a great day.

Bye-bye.

Simon, come sit.

I love you.

Have a great day.

Have a great day. Come sit.

Have a great day.

Have a great day.

See you next time. Bye. Have a great day.