Ritual and Worship

Core tenets that state what an act of worship or ritual accomplishes and why it is required or effective, as distinct from the practical how-to steps of performing it. This includes tenets on the purpose and power of prayer, the meaning of a sacrament or ordinance, the necessity of a particular rite for a stage of life or the afterlife, and the belief that a ritual act genuinely changes a spiritual state rather than merely symbolizing it. A tenet about a moral obligation carried out without ritual form, such as almsgiving as an ethical duty rather than a rite, belongs instead under ethics and conduct.