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Perhaps Christians shouldn't be buying booze on the Sabbath

Sunday, April 27, 2003

By Lynda Guydon Taylor, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

High on modernizing state stores and tired of losing a day's business to other states, the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board on Feb. 9 opened 61 stores for Sunday sales for the first time.

The measure, approved by the Legislature last year, inspired some initial criticism, including from state store employees.

In the meantime, the state is giving the pilot project a two-year run and taking a wait-and-see attitude.

Think Tank invited five Washington County residents to discuss the issue of Sunday sales: Diane Long of Canonsburg; Bill Brna of Carroll, Steve M. Dugas of Slovan in Smith, and Mabel Cole and Shelly Edwards, both of Washington.

All are former drinkers except for Long, who does it occasionally.

No doubt about it, Sabbath sales don't have a prayer with Cole, Edwards and Long. Brna thinks the state should not be involved in liquor sales, period. Dugas, however, wonders: What's the big deal?

Upon hearing of the plan, the first thing Cole thought was: Is it necessary? As a Christian, she came equipped with a Bible and a ready answer to the spiritual side of the equation. In Matthew 12, she found scriptures demanding Sunday be kept holy.

"The Sabbath is for worship services. Therefore anything that is going to hinder worship service with the Lord should not be done on Sunday. But if it's out of mercy or a need of helping your fellow man then yes, we have God's OK to do that. So we ought not see any Christians coming out of the state stores on Sundays," said Cole, eliciting laughs from the others.

Edwards wonders, with Monday through Saturday to buy liquor, why is it necessary to open on the seventh day. While certain activities, such as work, are unavoidable on Sunday, buying alcohol is not one of them. Malls are open for business. The lottery is played. One day should be set aside for not selling alcohol, she said.

"I guess it's good for people that enjoy, you know, having the privilege of going to a liquor store on Sunday, but I just don't feel like it's really necessary," Edwards said.

Long also believes Sunday should be reserved for worship and rest.

Making a slightly different argument, Brna said, "I don't think the state should be in the liquor business at all. None of it is a function of government. Secondly, I agree that it is not necessary to have it available seven days. If anybody's going to have a party on Sunday, they can always buy the liquor on Saturday, so I don't believe that we need it ... but then again I don't believe the state should have anything to say in it at all."

Dugas agrees the state has no business in the liquor business.

"I think the state should get out of the liquor business and privatize it. It [the state] is still going to control liquor like beer distributorships," he said.

But while the other panelists might not see the wisdom of Sunday sales, Dugas said, "If you don't drink, you don't drink. It's a free country. I don't feel you should penalize other people who want to drink. Maybe that's the only way they can relax."

But as Cole sees it, those who disagree have a responsibility to pay more attention to the people they elect.

"Laws don't get passed without persons who introduce them, so I think we as voters have gotten kind of lax. We start voting in those in office not based on their moral values and beliefs but if we like them or not," she said.

While Cole does not try to impose her views on others, she believes as a Christian she is obligated to be "a witness for others. It's a choice to serve God and a choice to be secular."

She also kept returning to the question of why Sunday sales are necessary when bars and restaurants are open for business.

Brna agreed. "You're not imposing your beliefs on someone else. We all have the responsibility to follow our own consciences."

Then, too, Long called it a contradiction that, on the one hand, the state sells alcohol but on the other, tells people not to drink and drive, and arrests those who do.

"I wouldn't care if they banned alcohol completely," Long said. "I know they never would. A lot of our legislators, I'm quite sure, drink, so I doubt that will ever be."

If anything, Dugas believes, the more the state tries to stop people from drinking, the more they want to drink.

In the final analysis, he said, Sunday sales don't matter. "We don't have blue laws anymore. Grocery stores are open 24 hours a day. What's the difference? Why should you close one part of retail? Some people only have Sunday to shop. Why penalize them?"

"What I would tell someone who doesn't have a problem with it at all is that we are to be our brother's keeper, and we need to think sometimes past ourselves," Cole said.

Lynda Guydon Taylor can be reached at ltaylor@post-gazette.com or 724-746-8813.