[canadaduane]

I grew up Mormon as well and have since left. But I find a lot of value in traditions like this. We (post-Mormons) tongue-in-cheek call the Sabbath "Second Saturday," but I do think there's a loss that includes both the Sabbath as a communal good and the individual "day of rest" (except for lay member leaders who are exhausted at the end of a 10-hour meeting-filled Sabbath).

Another tradition I value is the monthly single-day fast. There are contemplative, compassionate, and health benefits to fasting.

But traditions don't require you to know all of the benefits before you start doing them--they just give you the program and ask/cajole you to get with it. IMO, a memeplex that comes with "arbitrary traditions bundled with turns-out-to-have-good-reasons traditions" is better than arriving in life with a zero vector for direction--i.e. no tradition at all.