What Are You Looking For? Part 2: The Liturgy and the Sacraments

The Sacrament of Anointing of the Sick

The Sacrament of Anointing of the Sick

                We have now come to the final sacrament in the Sacraments of Healing: the Sacrament of Healing of the Sick.  If you have ever watched a Protestant “healer” on television, let me just say, it’s not like that.  If you have ever attended a Protestant healing service, especially a Pentecostal/Charismatic one, it’s not like that either.  For one thing, it’s not a “service”, though it may happen after a Mass, especially a weekday Mass.  It’s a sacrament, and as such, there are specific norms that must be followed. 

                First of all, the sacrament can only be administered by the bishop or a priest.  Yes, lay people can and should pray for the sick, and some do possess the charismatic gift of healing, but they never administer the Sacrament of Anointing of the Sick.  This follows the instructions given in James 5: 14: “Is anyone among you sick?  He should summon the presbyters of the church, and they should pray over him and anoint [him] with oil in the name of the Lord.” (NABRE)  In case you are wondering, in James’ day the word “presbyter” had the same meaning as our modern word, “priest”.  Even then the command was clear: if one was seriously ill one should call a priest.  Note that the sacrament is for those who are seriously ill.  It is for those with life-threatening diseases, or when facing surgery, or those times when life could end.  We don’t call a priest every time we have a cold or the flu, even though we’re pretty sure we’re dying – at least at that moment.

Like all of the other sacraments, there is a liturgy involved in the sacrament.  The sick person should have made or make a good confession before receiving the sacrament.  Like receiving all sacraments, being in a state of grace is important.  And receiving the Eucharist should happen as well, if at all possible.  “The sacrament of Anointing of the Sick is given to those who are seriously ill by anointing them on the forehead and hands with duly blessed oil – pressed from olives or from other plants – saying only once, “Through this holy anointing may the Lord in his love and mercy help you with the grace of the Holy Spirit.  May the Lord who frees you from sin save you and raise you up.” (CCC 1513)

So what is accomplished by the sacrament?  I would be lying if I told you that every time the Sacrament of Anointing of the Sick is administered the sick person recovers their full health and life goes on, and no one would believe me if I tried.  What the sacrament does is that it puts the sick person firmly in God’s hands.  “It is a particular gift of the Holy Spirit” (CCC 1520).  What this means is that, through the sacrament, the sick person is encouraged and strengthened to face whatever lies before them.  By the Holy Spirit they are given the courage to persevere through pain and suffering until the natural end of their life; or until their body regains its health.

The Sacrament of Anointing of the Sick also puts the sick person in “Union with the passion of Christ.” (CCC 1521)  When we suffer, we begin to understand what St. Paul wrote about in Colossians 1: 24: “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his body, which is the church.” (NABRE)  It is a very Catholic concept that we can offer up our sufferings, our sicknesses, for others and in doing so, “fill up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ.”  So what are the sufferings of Christ?  Psalm 69:20 – 21 reads: “Insult has broken my heart and I despair; I looked for compassion, but there was none, for comforters, but found none.  Instead they gave me poison for my food; and for my thirst they gave me vinegar.” (NABRE)  Those are the sufferings we fill up.  When we offer up our sickness, we mystically join our loneliness and suffering to Christ on the cross, and in doing so, ease his, just a little bit.

We also receive “an ecclesial grace” (CCC 1552) when we receive the sacrament.  Just as we united our sufferings to the suffering of Christ, so that grace is taken and applied, both to us, and to the entire Church.  It is possible (though don’t ask me to explain how it is possible) that your suffering here leads directly to the salvation of someone on the other side of the world.  Or it accomplishes the release of a soul from Purgatory.  We don’t know what all is accomplished by our suffering, other than that it is a part of our own purification process.  But that’s because we can’t know all that grace can accomplish throughout the world.

The final thing accomplished by the sacrament is that it prepares us for our final journey.  Therefore, when the sacrament is administered to those on the point of death, it is called sacramentum exeuntium (the sacrament of those departing).  “In addition to the Anointing of the Sick, the Church offers those who are about to leave this life the Eucharist as viaticum.  Communion in the body and blood of Christ, received at this moment of “passing over” to the Father, has a particular significance and importance.  It is the seed of eternal life and the power of resurrection, according to the words of the Lord: ‘He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.’” (CCC 1524)  Thus what began with Baptism, Confirmation and First Eucharist, now ends with Reconciliation, Anointing of the Sick and Final Eucharist.  The circle is complete, and we return to the one who has lovingly drawn us to his side since the day we were born.