What to Expect When You Visit
About the Episcopal Church
Sacraments are the "outward and visible signs of inward and spiritual grace." Grace is God's love freely given to us for forgiveness and spiritual renewal.
The two sacraments of the Gospel instituted and ordained by Christ Himself as essential for every Christian's salvation are:
-Holy Baptism Administered once as a pledge of repentance and trust in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. It is the means by which God adopts us as His Children and makes us members of Christ's Body, the Church.
-Holy Eucharist In it we share bread and wine for the continual remembrance of Christ9s life, death, and resurrection until His coming again. Through it we receive the forgiveness of our sins and the strengthening of our union with Christ and one another. Does the Episcopal Church offer any other sacraments?
Yes. There are five other sacramental rites:
-Confirmation: the rite in which we express mature commitment to Christ and receive strength from the Holy Spirit through prayer and the laying on of hands by a Bishop.
-Holy Matrimony: the sacrament of marriage, in which a man and a woman commit their lives to one another and receive God's blessing.
-Reconciliation of a Penitent: the confession of ones sins to God in the presence of a priest and the receiving of the assurance of God's forgiveness and the grace of absolution.
-Ministration to the Sick: the anointing of the sick with oil, or the laying on of hands, by which God's grace is given for the healing of spirit, mind, and body.
-Ordination: the sacrament consecrating Christians in service to God as bishops, priests and deacons.
The above content is from St. Luke's on the Lake Episcopal Church in Austin, Texas
http://www.stlukesonthelake.org/newcomers/episcopal.html
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