Pope: Anointing of the Sick is not only for the moment of death
July 03, 2024
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CWN Editor's Note: In a video for his July prayer intention (for the pastoral care of the sick), Pope Francis emphasized that “the Anointing of the Sick is not a sacrament only for those who are at the point of death.”
The Pope advised the very ill and the elderly to receive the sacrament, since it is “one of the sacraments of healing, of restoration, that heals the spirit.”
Without quoting from the Catechism of the Catholic Church, the Pope’s words recalled the Catechism’s teaching that “the sacrament of Anointing of the Sick has as its purpose the conferral of a special grace on the Christian experiencing the difficulties inherent in the condition of grave illness or old age. The proper time for receiving this holy anointing has certainly arrived when the believer begins to be in danger of death because of illness or old age.”
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