The Power of the Sacraments
"The term sacrament itself means a ritual invoking the power of the sacred into the soul of the individual. Sacraments provide symbolic tasks for growth into spiritual maturity and healing" Caroline Myss
In one week, I bore witness to the sacrament of Baptism and Ordination, at the beginning and the end of the week respectively. Baptism literally means to receive or bestow an expression of grace representing gratitude for one's life in the physical world. Ordination is to receive or bestow the grace to make sacred one's path of service.
My niece and nephew's baptism was beautiful with the priest asking us to reflect on our own Baptism. I remembered quite a bit of what I had learnt from Myss' teachings in the Anatomy of the Spirit and the transmuting of the energy of Baptism in the sacred truth that All is One. All is one is the acknowledgment of interconnection of all life. Our first encounter with the truth that All is One is in within our biological families where we learn to respect the blood bond. It is within our families and our places of worship that we learn that we are part of one Divine family. The parents, god parents and congregation (community and friends) commit to fulfilling the responsibilities to teach children spiritual principles and to build a strong foundation of faith. How often do we truly reflect on our commitments after witnessing Baptism to Baptism. Myss speaks about our Spiritual adult Baptism as symbolically carrying the need to accept our original families as being "divinely chosen" for teaching us the lessons we need to learn in our lifetime and secondly for accepting responsibility for being a member of the human tribe, for doing unto others as we would do unto ourselves and respecting all life on this earth.
It is when we start to consider those who are different to be less than us, that it creates conflict within our spirit. Then we "violate" the sacrament of baptism.
The week ended with with a Diaconate Ordination which Myss links to the sacred teaching of "Seek Only the Truth" . In the literal sense, it is the act of becoming a priest/ being made a priest but we all can bring holiness into the work that we do. Each one of us can be channels of love and support and be in service. Priesthood traditionally is associated with actual ordination.
Our personal "ordination" teaches us about acting on our internal compass- our true north. No one can determine the task you are called to do. When your people acknowledge that they benefit from your inner-directed path as much as you do, the mutual benefit identifies your "ordained calling". The beauty of ordination is that it symbolically recognises the contribution of our spirits to others lives far more than the contributions to our tasks. 
As my niece and nephew grow and become to know and learn about the sacraments as they navigate through life, from their Baptism to their "Ordination" - referring to their callings and purpose, may they always know their true North.
