Making this commitment to my fraternity did not mean I was selling my soul or giving away ANYTHING of mine. In fact, the only thing I gave them was my "word". I committed myself to living the values of my fraternity and promised to hold my fellow brothers accountable when they fell short.
Less than one year later, I am one of only a small number of brothers with the secret combination to our safe where our ritual is kept. Every once in a while I think about bringing this book out of the safe to share with the chapter "outside" of the scheduled ritual during our initiation ceremony. I think that this is important, especially when our members' values begin to slip. Similar to renewing wedding vowels, this would be a reminder of the sacrifice we made by swearing to the oath and giving our "word" and the commitment that the oath entailed.
Each of our oaths are different but I'm certain that they're all very much the same. The day I took the oath to my fraternity was a very special day for me because I then became a part of something unique. My oath would probably mean very little to another fraternity or sorority member, just like anyone else's oath would probably mean little to me. The importance of the oath is to reinforce and verbally express one's commitment. Whether that commitment be to service, leadership, integrity, progress, etc., each of us was impacted by the commitment that we made to our organizations. Every oath is unique but they are all about the same theme: commitment.
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