ORDINATION

The ceremony of conferring orders in church, which is derived, by nil communities that admit a regular commi ion and succe ion in the ministry the time of the apostles, from the authority of Jesus of whom it is said, in St. John's Gospel (xx., 21), after his resurrection, he said, " As my father has sent even so send I you:" and then he breathed upon them, said to them, " Receive ye the Holy Ghost: whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them, and whosesoever sins ye retain ihey are retained." Prayer and the of hands nre also mentioned as forming part of ceremony of ordination of deacons in the Acts; and or is even now conferred under similar forms in most churches. The Romish Church holds ordination to be the sixth of seven sacraments, as being an institution of Christ confer ing a special grace. The Protestants show that it differs a sacrament, according to the received definition of as containing no matter, like the water in baptism, or elements in the eucharist. They deny that the ve els are delivered to the newly-ordained person according the Romish rite, can be taken as the matter of a sacra [s. 873]