“_Ans._—We observe Sunday instead of Saturday because the Catholic Church, in the Council of Laodicea (A.D. 336), transferred the solemnity from Saturday to Sunday.”—_“__The Convert’s Catechism of Catholic Doctrine,__”__ by Rev. Peter Geiermann, C. SS. R., page 50, third edition, 1913, a work which received the __“__apostolic blessing__”__ of Pope Pius X, Jan. 25, 1910._ What was done at the Council of Laodicea was but one of the steps by which the change of the Sabbath was effected. See under questions 17-21. The date usually given for this council is 364 A.D. 12. Do Catholic authorities acknowledge that there is no command in the Bible for the sanctification of Sunday? They do. NOTE.—“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 never sanctify.”—_Cardinal Gibbons, in __“__The Faith of Our Fathers,__”__ edition 1892, page 111._ “Sunday is a Catholic institution, and its claims to observance can be defended only on Catholic principles.... From beginning to end of Scripture there is not a single passage that warrants the transfer of weekly public worship from the last day of the week to the first.”—_Catholic Press (Sydney, Australia), Aug. 25, 1900._ 13. Do Protestant writers acknowledge the same? They do. NOTE.—“Is there no express commandment for observing the first day of the week as Sabbath, instead of the seventh day?—None whatever. Neither Christ, nor His apostles, nor the first Christians celebrated the first day of the week instead of the seventh as the Sabbath.”—_New York Weekly Tribune, May 24, 1900._ “The Scriptures nowhere call the first day of the week the Sabbath.... There is no Scriptural authority for so doing, nor of course any Scriptural obligation.”—_The Watchman (Baptist)._ “The observance of the first instead of the seventh day rests on the testimony of the church, and the church _alone_.”—_Hobart Church News (Episcopalian), July 2, 1894._ For additional testimonies, see reading on page 454. 14. How did this change in observance of days come about, suddenly or gradually? Gradually. NOTES.—“The Christian church made no formal, but a gradual and almost unconscious transference of the one day to the other.”—_“__The Voice From Sinai,__”__ by Archdeacon F. W. Farrar, page 167._ This of itself is evidence that there was no divine command for the change of the Sabbath. 15. For how long a time was the seventh-day Sabbath observed in the Christian church? For many centuries. In fact, its observance has never wholly ceased in the Christian church.