I was driving down into the Napa Valley the evening of the Sabbath after Thanksgiving, listening to National Public Radio, when I heard a story about protesters who had been arrested at a mall in Delaware the day before, for promoting "Buy Nothing Day." They wore festive red Santa hats and white T-shirts printed with the words "NOTHING—What you’ve been looking for."

Three sisters and their friend go to the mall yearly on "Black Friday," the day after Thanksgiving, to "not shop." Last year, however, they were asked to refrain from not shopping in the future. Instead they returned this year with a video camera to tape themselves not shopping. They were asked to leave but were arrested in the parking lot, for trespassing.

Buy Nothing Day was initiated thirteen years ago by Adbusters Media Foundation, of Vancouver, encouraging people to engage in symbolic protest against the "frantic consumer binge" by refusing to shop for twenty-four hours. Their Web site, adbusters.org, notes that Buy Nothing Day is now a worldwide event, drawing attention to the need for sustainable growth, for each of us to try to reduce our "footprint" on the earth, and to say No to big corporations: "Together we said to Exxon, Nike, Coke and the rest: enough is enough."

Bottomless shopping bags, antigreed pills, and protesters dressed as giant credit cards or "consumer sheep" are just some of the ways people around the world have tried to get the attention of shoppers. According to a New York Times article from 1997, protesters "passed out ’gift exemption certificates.’ And they suggested sweetly to shoppers that they spend their time with loved ones or resting instead of herding automatically to the stores."

As I drove down into the valley I found myself thinking, I have a Buy Nothing Day every week: It’s also called Sabbath.

As any Adventist over about thirty knows, the unofficial rules of Sabbath observance have gradually changed. When I was a girl in the 1950s, growing up in southern California, we had to wear shorts to the beach on Sabbath—no bathing suits—and we picnicked at tables on the grass, not down on the sand, as we would on a Sunday. (We also ate potato salad and olives from china plates, but I suspect that this was an Australian and not an Adventist thing.) No organized games on Sabbath; no activity that involved money, even if it was going to a state park. This would include eating at a restaurant, of course, except perhaps in an emergency. And certainly no shopping.

Clearly, these rules varied from family to family, but the trajectory seems indisputable: most Adventists have relaxed their approach to the rules over the years considerably. And I would argue that much of this has been based in a genuinely less legalistic theology, and not merely a thoughtless slide down a slippery slope. I like to think, optimist that I am, that Adventists have learned something of what Jesus meant by his statement that "The Sabbath was made to benefit people, and not people to benefit the Sabbath" (Mark 2:27 NLT).

But where do we stop? Most Adventists I know are quite comfortable eating out on Sabbath. Indeed, it’s a way to let women who cook all week truly rest and enjoy the day. And rules against paying money to enter a state park seem to be disappearing, too. I was recently told, "If it’s okay to do it on Sabbath, it’s okay to pay for it." This makes sense to me.

But do we want to end up keeping Sabbath the way most of our neighbors appear to keep Sunday—going to church in the morning, then spending the afternoon mowing the lawn, watching sports on TV, or—shopping?

This is where the concept behind Buy Nothing Day may help us out. We still need boundaries, and for years this has been mine. I will do many things on Sabbath that I was not brought up to do, but what I won’t do is shop. I don’t mean I wouldn’t purchase something in an emergency, but "going shopping" as an activity for me is out. Not because money is dirty, but because in the United States we all buy too much, own too much, and it begins to feel like a plague, deep in our guts. Buying becomes a substitute for so much more important things, things we have time for on Sabbath—talking with friends, walking under the sky, napping, reading, contemplating.

Indeed, several of the "101 Things to do on Buy Nothing Day" from the Adbusters Web site sound like pretty good suggestions for Sabbath: Sit in the sun, Walk in the Rain, Meditate, Pray, Take a bath, Grow bean sprouts, Look for bats, Be a Samaritan, Borrow a dog and take it for a walk, Learn a poem, Write a song, Feed the birds, Read a book, Help an old lady, Tell someone you love them. (One sounds especially Adventist—make special Buy Nothing Day hamburgers out of nothing, and pass them out for free!)

Refusing to shop, buying nothing, one day a week is a good reminder that this consumer culture’s values are not our own; that we don’t think celebrities are more important than less glamorous folks; that one can certainly be both too rich and too thin; that a sweet, quiet day with friends and family, a day of praying and singing, of slow food and conversation, and maybe a saunter through the hills or beside a river, puts us in touch with what matters most.

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