Book Review: ‘Tree of Sacrament’

Nick Galieti’s book “Tree of Sacrament” is a quick, concise read on the importance of the Sacrament. For too many Latter-day Saints, the Sacrament can be an ordeal as we worry about keeping the kids quiet and getting on to the talks or testimony. Galieti reminds us that the Sacrament is the primary reason to come to Church in the first place.

Galieti’s book has dozens of small gems. Here’s Elder Holland, comparing the Sacrament to the Passover: “Do we see it (the sacrament) as our Passover, remembrance of our safety and deliverance and redemption?”

Here’s President Kimball reminding us of the importance of keeping covenants: “Remembering covenants prevents apostasy. The is the real purpose of the Sacrament, to keep us from forgetting, to help us to remember.”

And here’s the author himself: “Today, the bread is broken as a symbol of how the body of Christ was broken during the acts of the Atonement.”

Galieti analyzes the Sacrament prayers, the doctrinal foundations of the sacrament and the comparisons of the Sacrament to the tree of life. He emphasizes again and again the sacred nature of the Sacrament, and concludes with David O McKay emphasizing: “no more sacred ordinance is administered in the Church of Christ than the administration of the Sacrament.”

Galieti has an appendix that will make one of the best stories every for your own Sacrament talk, a parable about a young man who sacrificed himself for the good of his family. You have to read it to really appreciate it.

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About Geoff B.

Geoff B graduated from Stanford University (class of 1985) and worked in journalism for several years until about 1992, when he took up his second career in telecommunications sales. He has held many callings in the Church, but his favorite calling is father and husband. Geoff is active in martial arts and loves hiking and skiing. Geoff has five children and lives in Colorado.