What feelings does this word evoke? What sorts of memories does it
recall? Which of your senses start to tingle? How would you represent
what this word means to you?
Sacred has the definition of 'revered due to association with holiness. Holiness, or sanctity, is in general the state of being holy (perceived by religious individuals as associated with divinity) or sacred (considered worthy of spiritual respect or devotion; or inspiring awe or reverence among believers).'
For me, I'm not so much influenced by the opinions or practices of'religious individuals as associated with divinity.' That's probably because once upon a time in another life I worked for the Great Church. I saw 'em up close and personal, warts and all, politics and abuses of office and so on. I loved and honored many who I knew. Our clergy are PEOPLE, folks, and they have faults and idiosyncracies and they make mistakes. Many have a genuine calling to serve; I'd venture to say most of them began with that, but there are some who lost that along the way.
So. What I'm told is 'sacred' by the Great Church or its servants is not necessarily what I'd label 'sacred.'
I find much of nature to be sacred: ah, my beloved Mama Ocean, who heals, who washes away the insignificant, whose constancy is ancient. The mountains, old wisdom and that constancy again (well, maybe not so much the volcanic ones, but even they move and breathe and do as they are supposed to do). Any animal or bird or bug -- the flowers, the grasses, the trees -- how DOES a tree know when to pop its leaves, and isn't it a miracle and SACRED that they do every year, every single spring? How does that hummingbird DO that hover thing? Wow.
Our bodies are sacred temples, mysterious in the infinite ways they are engineered to carry us through life, that we are all so alike and yet so, so different. Babies are sacred little beings when they are born, innocent and unknowing and wise and perfect.
The energy of all things is sacred. We are all connected through that energy, and to practice feeling it, tapping into the ancient and endless well of energy is to touch immortality, or as close as we could come to knowing it. Meditation is a powerful way to do that. Being outside and consciously raising our individual energy to blend with that of the energy of all things around us is sacred.
I have been in places that hold a tangible energy and history, but I'm not sure I'd label them 'sacred' -- awe-worthy, perhaps, knowing the stones and wood and surroundings hold the traces of an energy that once inhabited that place, even recently. Communal energy raised in gratitude and praise and love is very powerful, and I often feel that in places of worship. Is that sacred? Perhaps.
I guess what makes something sacred for me is the purity of purpose and energy that marks a place or words or actions or even that which resides in a person. It simply IS, without agenda, without ego, and it resonates on a deeply personal, interior level. I am always grateful when I experience flashes of the sacred, and awed by the power it encompasses.