Confirmation Ceremony

Chances are if you grew up in the south, then you most likely have been to a church service before. I remember as a kid getting the wakeup call every Sunday morning from my mom, “Get up and get dressed for church!” Even if I did not feel like going, she would drag me out of bed and make me go. Anne Lamott writes about the same thing in her essay “Why I Make Sam Go to Church.” Lamott wrote “Why I Make Sam Go to Church” in 1999 as part of a collection of autobiographical essays in a book called Traveling Mercies. My main reaction to this work was a positive one. I thought the essay was eye opening in a sense and it shows that everyone needs guidance and help from others sometimes.

In the novel Ceremony by Leslie Silko, the main character, Tayo, shows apparent madness as he suffers from PTSD due to fighting in World War II. Madness can be defined as mental delusion or the behavior arising from it. The delusions that result of Tayo’s madness, hallucinations of important people he has lost and frequent flashbacks of the worst parts of the war, occur in a reasonable manner because it is common for people to be affected by war in such a negative way and fail to understand what is truly real. The product of Tayo’s madness gives truth to the fact that if one holds on to someone or something for too long, it is impossible to move on in a positive direction.

“A rite of passage is a public ceremony that marks, recognizes, celebrates or is believed to actually cause a change in a person and her or his status, usually brought about or related to increasing age” (Peoples, Bailey). Almost every culture has rituals that signal a change in life. Marriage is one of the most common rites of passage in any culture. Weddings and marriage ceremonies are clear transitions from adolescence to adulthood. “Some form of marriage is known to have existed in all human societies. Its traditional function in most of these societies has been to stabilize sexual relations and to unite a man and a woman in order to provide care for the young. In addition, marriage has linked and allowed for economic exchanges between different kin groups and has served as the primary coming of age ritual for women” (Nelson).

Rituals play a significant role in all cultures. A ritual ‘is the practice or embodiment of beliefs expressed in structured action or prescribed procedures that often link to the sacred.’ Rituals are created by taking events from everyday life and giving them some sort of symbolic meaning. As one of the founding concepts of our discipline, ritual has long been a cornerstone of anthropological thought: from the works of Emile Durkheim through Arnold van Gennep, Victor Turner and Terry Lovat. Within this presentation I will be outlining the similarities and differences between Bar Mitzvah and Confirmation, and I will also explain the impact which the ritual has on the individual and society

Native Americans are losing their background and where they come from starting with culture and heritage that has been passed down to each generation. Not losing site of that, there is a chance in seeing the positive of preserving and continuing the culture and heritage of the Native Americans and bringing significance to ceremonies.

On another note, I want to address the issue of church attendance. Church attendance is NOT mandatory; however, it is in

I am part of Grace Covenant Church, which is part of an organization called, Every Nation. Every Nation has churches in Asia, Africa, Europe, Oceania, and America. Some folkways that I practice are going to church every Sunday and talking about the message with my family afterwards. For me, church has never been about meeting with people who think like me, it was my time to spend with God. I always preferred one on one time with God, rather than group discussion. Our church holds yearly mission trips, and frequently holds

In recent days I had the opportunity to go back to North Carolina for a few short days. There, with a heavy heart from a loss in the family, I had nothing else to look towards. I’ve always heard of individuals finding peace, faith, blessings, and love of Christ from attending church. I’ve never been a person who put their faith into a higher power. As I was growing up my parents never wanted to force me into any religion without me knowing everything about it and choosing which route to take on my own. As the years treaded on, I never bothered myself to learn about the many different religions and what each stands for. So I used this opportunity as mine to attend church for the very first time. I attended the Roman Catholic services held

Hey everyone I hope you’ve had a great day. I would like to be your Catholics in Action Vice President. A little about myself I was born and raised Catholic, I help my parents with the Elementary School RE (religious education) program, I am an altar server at my parish, and I’ve had the honor to be a Confirmation Sponsor. Now proceeding on with a few of my qualifications. For two years I have been Co President for Interact Club which is a service club. Also the past two years I have been a Youth Board Member at my parish HNJ planning many youth nights and even a few rallies. I have also given two talks about our belief and religion one being how God is in our Midst, the other if God exists in the world why is there so much evil. I have aswell

The transitions into Longwood University, during New Lancer Days encourage growth, installed a higher level of patience, and also demonstrated the realization that adulthood is in full effect. Even though some sessions were more bearable than the other each had its own purpose.

I was raised in a home that was Baptist, but we did not attend church every week. I did attend church by myself from the third grade through the ninth grade. We lived in an upper-middle class neighborhood that was almost 100% white. My aunts and uncles, as well as my grandparents, lived close by so we visited frequently.

Growing up I always lived in a religious household. We always prayed before we ate, prayed before we went to bed, and always went to church on Sunday and Wednesday night. While I never questioned these actions and never tried to rebel against them, I still didn’t understand the importance of them either. I was merely walking in my parents footsteps, doing what my parents told me, singing along to the children’s songs in Sunday school, gave a tithing of my allowance every Sunday, but my life was void of the real meanings of my actions. This went on for years. Because I had not yet read through the Bible to understand why these actions had any meaning, they were just things I did all the time and I thought that was normal and that was what it meant to be a Christian.

In Christian worldview, believers must attend church. Church is something that God desire for Christians to do. It is a must and there are no substitutions for attending church. Church is “an expression of our love to God” (Robbins, 2015). It is where one can communicate to God by thanking, honoring, and praising Him.

I've been attending church for as long as I can remember. The earliest time I remember going to church was when I was in pre-school, and I attended the same church until high school. Sundays were routine, we attended church, went out to eat after with other members of the church, and then went home to watch either football or baseball (sports being my second religion). Skipping church was never an option, nor did I really want to miss it. I had good friends at church, and was genuinely interested in the bible and the stories we read.

Have you ever felt so out of place at an event? This is how I felt when attending a friend’s Catholic wedding. I have attended many weddings; on the other hand, this was completely different than the standard wedding I imagined. The setting of the church, the discipline the Catholics have with their religion, and the wedding ceremony was nothing I imagined when being invited to this wedding.