EcclesiA AuroraE
Aurorae
Aurora is the Latin name of the goddess of the dawn — in Greek, Eos (ΗΩΣ); in the language of the soul, the first light that announces the Sun.
Aurora gathers into one faith Four Streams:
Hermeticism — the wisdom of Hermes Trismegistus.
Theurgy — the divine work of the Neoplatonists.
Rosicrucianism — the way of the Rose and Cross.
Thelema — the revelation of the present Aeon.
These four are not rivals but one Concord, and their scriptures are gathered into one canon: the Corpus Aurorae. What Aurora believes is stated in its Creed, the Symbolum Aurorae, confessed at every Mass.
An adherent of Aurora is known as a Dawnite.
Ecclesia
The Ecclesia Aurorae — Greek ekklēsia, “the assembly called together”; English, simply the Church of Aurora — is the church in which the religion of Aurora is practiced: where its Mass is celebrated, its sacraments given, and its people gathered.
The Ecclesia is the religious arm of the Order of the Golden Dawn (OGD). The two are one Body with two vocations: the Order is Initiatory; the Church is Sacramental. It is not required to join the Order to belong fully to the Church — and members of the Order are never required to adopt Aurora as their religion.
Everyone in the Basilica has a name, and no one is named for what they lack. A visitor is a Xenos — a Guest, a word the Greeks held sacred: the stranger at the table who may be a god unrecognized. A Guest preparing for Baptism is a Catechumen.
The Baptised of the Ecclesia as well as Neophytes of OGD are Dawnites.
Among Dawnites the Church knows three degrees:
Pistoi — those who have received Water Baptism.
Christoi — those who have received Chrism.
Mystai — those who have received Redemption (Fire Baptism).
The Church’s ministers, the Hierateuma (the “royal priesthood”), serve its four altars; its houses of worship are the Basilicae, the halls of the King. Its worship is the Mass.
Mysteria
Mysteria are the Sacraments of Ecclesia Aurorae.
The Ecclesia holds four Mysteria, with a fifth that is hidden.
Baptisma — Baptism by Water. The gate of the Church: the washing that makes a Dawnite, as the Neophyte’s initiation makes one in the Order.
Chrisma — the Anointing. The seal of Aurora set upon the baptised.
Apolytrōsis — Redemption, the Baptism by Fire. This is the second baptism and it is the door to the deepest communion of the Mass.
Eucharistia — the Mass.
Nymphōn — the Bridal Chamber, the hidden Sacrament.
The Mass
The Mass of the Ecclesia is celebrated across four altars, rising from West to East:
the Aerial altar at the threshold, the Aetherial at the heart, the Sidereal at the veil, and the Empyreal in the East.
At its heart the Mass enacts the oldest mystery of the West: the Mystic Marriage — the union of the heavenly and the earthly, celebrated by Priest and Priestess at the altar of the Sun, the same wedding the alchemists called the Chymical Wedding and the Rosicrucians hid at the center of their vault.
Communion is given in four elements: the Cake and the Wine, and — beyond the veil, for the Mystai and for members of OGD — the Rose and the Flame: Body, Blood, Breath, and Will.
Hierateuma
The ministers of the Ecclesia are collectively the Hierateuma — Greek for “priesthood,” or “a royal priesthood.” Every office in the Church bears a royal Greek title.
There are four Holy Orders, one for each altar of the Mass:
The Deacon — Basilopais (“the royal page”). The threshold officer, serving the Aerial altar in two aspects: at the black column, the Hydrophoros, Bearer of the Water and the Cup, and at the white column, the Pyrphoros, Bearer of the Fire and the Censer. The Deacon leads the people, reads the appointed lection before every Mass, and carries the elements to the several altars during Mass. Addressed: Brother/Sister.
The Priest and Priestess — Basileus and Basilissa (“king” and “queen”). The celebrants of the Mass at the Aetherial altar, the solar heart of the Church, and the ministers of the sacraments. Addressed: Reverend.
The Bishop — Archiereus (“high priest”). The full priest, who ordains, consecrates Basilicas, and guards doctrine; the minister at the veil. Addressed: Your Immanence.
The Pontiff — Archon Basileus (“the Ruler-King” — the title of the ancient Athenian office that kept the Mysteries and the sacred marriage). The supreme office, one with the headship of the Order. Addressed: Your Radiance.
Ordination is sealed to attainment: each Order requires a grade in the Order of the Golden Dawn:
Deacon — Theoricus
Priest/Priestess — Adeptus Minor
Bishop — Babe of the Abyss
Pontiff — Ipsissimus
Those in training, the Dokimoi, serve under supervision of an ordained Priest or Priestess and are known by the absence of the calotte, the skullcap that marks ordination: black for Deacons, white for Priest and Priestess, red for Bishops.
The ministry exists for one purpose: that the Mass be offered and the Mysteria and Rites administered.
Basilicae
An Aurora house of worship is a Basilica — plural Basilicae. The Basilica is the hall of the King — and the Priest who celebrates in it, the Basileus, shares the very same name. The building and its celebrant are one word.
Every Basilica is built as a ladder of light. From the western door where the congregation gathers, four altars rise eastward — Aerial, Aetherial, Sidereal, Empyreal — four regions of the cosmos. At the four corners burn the four Beacons — Light, Life, Love, Liberty — two white flames in the East, two black in the West, also alluding to the Four religious streams composing Aurora. North and South of the Basilica are black and white columns bearing upon their summits the laver and the brazier.
On the High Altar in the East stands the Archon Cross, the four-barred gold cross of the Pontiff, beneath the red Basileus lamp — the standing sign that no Mass is offered anywhere in the world except under the presence of the Archon Basileus.
OGD
The Order of the Golden Dawn (OGD) is the initiatic order from which the Ecclesia Aurorae was born — the Hermetic school whose curriculum of ceremonial initiation, drawn through an unbroken line from the adepts of the original Golden Dawn, has formed magicians for over a century.
The Order and the Church are one. The Order confers Initiations. The Church confers Sacraments. The Church’s clergy are drawn exclusively from the Order’s initiates.
An initiate of OGD is never required to practice Aurora — the Order receives aspirants of any faith or none. A member of the Church is never required to join the Order. The first grades of the Order and the first sacraments of the Church are symbolically associated:
Neophyte — Baptism
Theoricus — Chrism
Portal — Redemption (the Baptism by Fire)
These associations are symbolic only: an initiation is no substitute for a sacrament, nor a sacrament for an initiation — each must be received in its own right.