Initiation (Christianity)

When the process of evangelization has occurred, bringing the new Christian into the body of Christ, then the process of initiation may be said to take place. This is very complex. The individual is said to be "born again", to be fully justified or acquitted before God, to be raised from death to life or awakened from a deep sleep. Converted from darkness to light, adopted into the family of God, a member of the body of Christ, he or she has entered the new covenant, incorporated into the kingdom of God, sanctified and set aside for the service of God in the world. Another description is as bond-slave of Jesus Christ. Having repented of sin the individual is enlightened and convicted by the Holy Spirit. Trust is not in his or her own merits but in the mercy and grace of God. Saved from sin, reconciled to God through the death of Jesus Christ, he or she has the internal witness of the Holy Spirit. Set free to love God, sent to love one's neighbour as one's self, equipped to stand up against the forces of evil which would hold bondage, the individual has been baptized and filled with the Holy Spirit, baptized with water, tested the powers of the age to come.

A metaphor for the process of initiation is the tearing of the veil of the temple "from top to bottom". The barrier between the area where all are admitted and the holy of holies where, naked, man enters the mysteries, is torn down by Christ's death on the cross. There is a complete and irrevocable change, so that the exoteric and the esoteric or religious and mysterious are no longer separated, the mysteries are open to all. Because the exoteric and esoteric are, to appearances, merged, no formal expression of their separation is possible although each is real in its own order. Only the context of the central rites, not their content, would indicate the esoteric or exoteric nature of what was occurring.

This explains why Christian spirituality tends not to include esoteric ways. It is for this reason that gnosticism is condemned by the Church. However, although formal esoteric traditions may be absent, some esoteric element is necessary for the tradition to have a "heart" as well as a "body". This part of the faith has not received emphasis, the interior part of spirituality being minimized while the exterior, peripheral and collective are the focus of attention. The liturgy (in the Orthodox Church) and the sacraments are mysteries. Thus baptism, while an exoteric experience for the person having no inkling as to its significance, may be an initiatic experience to the person aware of what is involved. Having accepted Christ, been baptized, one is filled with the Holy Spirit in confirmation or Chrismation, another initiation for the aware. Similarly the other sacraments, though treated exoterically by many, are inward to those who treat them that way, above all this being true of the Eucharist where the partaker receives the "holy mysteries" which are the body and blood of Christ.

The Christian tradition has thus conserved the virtuality of inner life, but following an esoteric way in Christianity is difficult under today's conditions, particularly because qualified spiritual instruction is lacking and because the contemplative life in monastic institutions is not contemplative in the sense that the term is understood in other religions.