Msgr. Peter J. Vaghi
Title of Series: "Sacraments: The Catholic Faith Celebrated"

Part 6: "The Healing Sacraments: Penance and Anointing of the Sick"

March 6th, 2008
First Thursday

It is not unusual to walk into a parish church
anywhere in the world on a Sunday or Saturday vigil
for Sunday and witness practically the entire
congregation line up for Holy Communion. It is a
beautiful sight to behold. In contrast, however, if
you visit a parish church on Saturday afternoon or
evening, or whenever the Sacrament of Penance is being
offered, you will typically notice a small line before
the confessional. This phenomenon has seemingly
occurred since the renewal of the Vatican Council.
What has happened to this wonderful healing sacrament,
especially as a preparation for Holy Communion?
St.Paul clearly teaches after all: "Whoever,
therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the
Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning
the body and blood of the Lord.” (1Cor 11:27)

A recent CARA study concludes that in the 1980’s 74
percent of Catholic adults participated at least once
a year in the Sacrament of Reconciliation. That same
study determined that the number has dropped to 26
percent in 2005.

We might ask ourselves why? Is no one any longer
perceived to be unworthy to receive the body and blood
of Jesus? Have we lost the sense of what worthiness
means? Do we even know that we are required to receive
Holy Communion worthily? Perhaps there is a bigger
question: have we lost the sense of sin? Is sin even
in our vocabularies?

Father John Baldovin, S.J. writing this past year for
America magazine concludes: “On the one hand, we’re
not obsessed with sin any longer. On the other hand,
people don’t think of themselves as sinners, which is
a big problem,” he admits. (America May 21, 2007, 14)
In that same article, our own Archbishop Wuerl
concludes: “Many are not all that open to recognizing
personal responsibility.”

As a priest in my 23rd year of priesthood and a priest
who has promoted this wonderful sacrament (and makes
it a regular part of my life) throughout my life as a
priest, I also have a view. Hence this meditation
entitled: “The Healing Sacraments: Penance and
Anointing of the Sick.”

Hopefully, this meditation will help us recoup the
uniqueness and importance of this sacramental
encounter with the healing Jesus. Hopefully, it will
arm us with reasons to assist in our efforts at
evangelization of others about the sacrament. You, in
a special way, are those who will make this
sacramental encounter appealing in our generation and
bring souls to God’s tender mercy. In effect,
confession must be or become an integral part of our
lives as Catholics. Not to is akin to Catholic lite.

Our Catholic teaching is clear that: “Individual and
integral confession of grave sins followed by
absolution remains the only ordinary means of
reconciliation with God and with the Church.” CCC 1497

The sacrament must, moreover, be readily available in
our parishes and with our priests. In addition, each
of us must personally invite our fellow Catholics to
receive this encounter of mercy if they have been away
and then hopefully, once returned, in a regular way.
The example of each one of us, priestly and lay, is of
paramount importance. Non dat quod non habet. (One can
not give what one does not have).

In the first order, it is the will of Jesus that His
healing continue in the life of the Church. “The Lord
Jesus Christ, physician of our souls and bodies…has
willed that his Church continue, in the power of the
Holy Spirit, his work of healing and salvation.” CCC
1421; USCCA 234 This authority was given to the
apostles on that first Easter Sunday night by the
Risen Lord: “…Receive the holy Spirit. Whose sins you
forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain
are retained .” Jn 20:22-23

In the words of Archbishop Wuerl: “…there is a
comforting simplicity to confession. With sincere
contrition we need only open our hearts to the priest,
recount our failings and ask forgiveness. What follows
is one of those moments in the life of the Church when
the awesome power of Jesus Christ is most clearly and
directly felt. In the name of the Church and Jesus
Christ, the priest absolves the penitent from sin. At
the heart of confession is the momentous action of
absolution that only a priest can grant by invoking
the authority of the Church and acting in the person
of Jesus Christ.” Reflections on God’s Mercy and our
Forgiveness, 3

This sacrament is a personal encounter with Jesus, the
healing Jesus, the same Jesus (in the person of the
priest) who spent a great part of His life on earth
healing and forgiving. The Sacrament of Penance is
extremely personal. Sins cannot be faxed, mailed or
delivered by Fed Ex. A number of years ago in southern
France, speaking to the French Bishops, our late Holy
Father John Paul II--speaking of the Sacrament of
Penance--said “At a period in which private life is
extolled and people wish to protect it against the
pressures and the anonymity of large human groups, the
act of confessing one’s sins and receiving from God a
word of forgiveness addressed personally to each
individual, is to proclaim that, in the human race,
each one counts before God.”

As you think about this sacrament, its very personal
nature, the potential for genuine and deep healing,
think of the life of the historical Jesus. Think,
above all, of His miracles. This sacrament is the open
door to miracles in our lives, too. This is a
sacrament of miracles. It is the grace of conversion,
that gradual and daily change of life that it offers.

When you pull back the velvet curtain or open the door
to the reconciliation room, think of Jesus healing the
paralytic at Capernaum in Mark 2 who was lowered
through the ceiling to the feet of Jesus because his
friends were unable to get to Jesus directly through
the front door. Before He told him to “Pick up your
mat and go home,” Jesus said to him “My son, your sins
are forgiven.” That shows the priority given to the
forgiveness of sins. The crowd had never seen anything
quite like this before.

Or John 8, the woman caught in the very act of
adultery! Such beautiful and healing and miraculous
language by Jesus in the face of the scribes and
Pharisees who wanted to stone her. “Neither do I
condemn you. Go and from now on do not sin any more.”

Or think of the prodigal son from the gospel of St.
Luke, perhaps a parable better described as the
“merciful father.” The new Adult Catechism of the
Catholic Church describes it in these words: “Christ’s
parable of the prodigal son illustrates the sublime
meaning of his earthly ministry, which is to forgive
sins, reconcile people to God, and lead us to true
happiness (cf. Lk 15:11-32).” USCCA 235

Even from the pulpit of the cross, a cross that is
central--in special fashion--to our Lenten pilgrimage,
the language of healing and forgiveness and mercy.
Remember the penitent criminal hanging next to Jesus
and remember Jesus’ words: “Amen, I say to you, today
you will be with me in Paradise.” Such consoling words
of healing and forgiveness from the gibbet of the
cross as Jesus hung dying! Yes, Jesus, as it were,
hearing confessions from the very cross itself, the
cross from which our salvation was won.

For many of us, the real issue is the word “sin.” For
sure it is not a politically correct word in recent
times. Many of us have lost the meaning of sin. Before
talking about the sacrament that continues the healing
mission of Jesus, a mission that is central to the
Church’s task, perhaps a word about what needs
healing. “The Sacrament of Penance must be seen within
the context of conversion from sin and a turn to God.”
USCCA 236

Not much emphasis, after all, has been placed on sin
itself, the very mystery and reality of sin in
Catholic preaching and teaching in the last 25 years.

In sharp contrast, the Catechism of the Catholic
Church gives much attention both to original sin and
to sin itself.

Lent is the time of year, par excellance, to focus on
the mystery of sin in our lives--that gnawing,
debilitating and paralyzing sin, that ONE sin perhaps
which eats away at us and deprives us of a full life
with God. That need not be. Lent is that special time
to correct that, to recoup the sense of sin in our
lives and experience ever anew His mercy with the
assurance that our sins are actually forgiven no
matter how often we confess the same sin or set of
sins.

The catechism teaches that “after that first sin, the
world is virtually inundated by sin.” CCC 401 This
should not surprise any of us--if we think about
it-- and yet it is much easier to live in denial with
the fantasy that sin does not exist. It is much easier
to dismiss the constant din of sirens that sound
throughout the District of Columbia every night, the
sound of guns, the cry for help of an innocent person,
the expanding drug culture, the high divorce ratio,
churches far short of capacity on Sunday. “After that
first sin, the world is virtually inundated by sin.”

Our Church teaches the reality of sin and original
sin. It teaches that as a result of original sin--that
first sin-- human nature is weakened in its powers, we
are more inclined to sin, subject to ignorance,
suffering and the domination of death. Original sin is
not a sin “committed” but “contracted.” It is a state
not an act. And each one of us without exception is a
recipient of this transmission from our first parents.

It is a deprivation of original holiness and justice.
Wounded human nature results. Genesis says--after they
disobeyed and ate the fruit from the tree of good and
bad “then the eyes of both of them were opened, and
they realized that they were naked; so they sewed fig
leaves together and made loincloths for themselves.”
Gen 3:7 They were full of shame and guilt.

There is still a tree of the knowledge of good and bad
in each of our lives. God continues to tell us “You
shall not eat it or even touch it, lest you die.”
These are God’s words to our first parents and to each
of us. Death results when we disobey, when we sin.

That tree symbolically represents “the insurmountable
limits” that we must freely recognize and respect with
trust. Sin results when we trust ourselves at the
expense of God. Sin results when we live as if God’s
Word does not exist. Sin results when we ignore the
limits--the 10 commandments, the beatitudes, the moral
teaching of the Church and resort to our own devices
and the alleged “solutions” that the world proposes.
Sin is a rejection of God who is the only true living
tree of life. Sin is a preference by man and his human
devices instead of a preference for God.

“Sin is before all else an offense against God, a
rupture of communion with him. At the same time, it
damages communion with the Church.” CCC 1440

Despite our weakened state and our proclivity to sin,
as followers of Jesus, we live in hope. In the words
of Benedict XVI in his new encyclical, citing St.
Paul, “…in hope we were saved.” Spe Salvi 1 That is
after all, our Christian inheritance. Death does not
have the last word. St. Paul says it so well: “For if,
by the transgression of one person, death came to
reign through that one, how much more will those who
receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of
justification come to reign in life through the one
person Jesus Christ.” Rom 5: 17

Jesus died that our sins might be forgiven--each and
every sin. And the Sacrament of Penance is precisely
where as Catholics we share in the healing and
forgiving fruits of His death out of love for us. It
is a Sacrament of conversion, confession and
forgiveness.

The Catechism lists the various names used for this
sacrament over the years--each reflecting a different
emphasis given tothat same sacrament. I believe that the
change in name for this sacrament has in part been
responsible for the misunderstanding of this sacrament.
The healing sacrament has been called:

l.) The sacrament of conversion--because it ritualizes
the “turning around” to the Father of one who has
sinned, a Father rich in mercy.

2.) The sacrament of Penance--which places primary
focus on the satisfaction or the penance one is given
by the priest at the end of the celebration.

3.) The sacrament of confession or simply
“confession”--which underscores the actual disclosure
or confession of sins to the priest which is an
essential part of the sacrament.

4.) The sacrament of forgiveness--since by the
priest’s sacramental absolution, the penitent receives
“pardon and peace,” an assurance that our sins are in
fact forgiven and that we are ready for a new lease on
life.

5.) The sacrament of Reconciliation--because it
imparts to the sinner the love of God who alone
reconciles. The sacrament involves a horizontal
reconciliation--with one’s brothers and sisters AND a
vertical reconciliation--with God.

At the heart of each of these titles and the very
basis of this sacrament, however, is the call to
conversion. It is Jesus’ repeated call to conversion.
The very first words of His public ministry were Mark
1:15, the words used on Ash Wednesday during the
distribution of ashes-- “The reign of God is at hand.
Reform your lives and believe in the gospel.”
Throughout His whole public ministry, Jesus takes very
seriously this call to repentance and reform. “This
call is an essential part of the proclamation of the
kingdom.” CCC 1427

Reform comes from the greek word metanoia which means
repent, conversion and change of heart. Repentance,
conversion is a graced event. The first conversion is
at Baptism and the second conversion is that daily
on-going process of turning to the Lord and away from
sin greatly aided by the regular reception of the
Sacrament of Reconciliation. The catechism makes clear
that it “is not just a human work. It is the movement
of a ‘contrite heart’ drawn and moved by grace to
respond to the merciful love of God who loved us
first.” CCC1428

The catechism states: “Interior repentance is a
radical reorientation of our whole life, a return, a
conversion to God with all our heart, an end of sin, a
turning away from evil, with repugnance toward the
evil actions we have committed. At the same time, it
entails the desire and resolution to change one’s
life, with hope in God’s mercy and trust in the help
of his grace.” CCC 1431

“The human heart is heavy and hardened. God must give
man a new heart....God gives us the strength to begin
anew.” CCC 1432 Repentance is ultimately the Lord’s
work in our lives but it requires our own cooperation.

How often at a penance service do we sing “Grant to us
O Lord a heart renewed” or how often do we pray psalm
51: “A pure heart create for me, O God, put a
steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me away from
your presence, nor deprive me of your holy spirit.”

“Christ instituted the sacrament of Penance for all
sinful members of his Church: above all for those who,
since Baptism, have fallen into grave sin, and have
thus lost their baptismal grace and wounded ecclesial
communion. It is to them that the sacrament of Penance
offers a new possibility to convert and recover the
grace of justification. The Fathers of the Church
present this sacrament as ‘the second plank [of
salvation] after the shipwreck which is the loss of
grace.’” CCC 1446

“The Sacrament of Penance is an experience of the gift
of God’s boundless mercy. Not only does it free us
from our sins but it also challenges us to have the
same kind of compassion and forgiveness for those who
sin against us.” USCCA 242 In the words of the Our
Father, we remember “Forgive us our sins as we forgive
those who sin against us.” To the extent that we
forgive others, our merciful Father will forgive us
our sins.

Although there have been changes in name, discipline
and the manner of celebration of this sacrament over
the centuries (and even since the conclusion of the
Vatican Council II), the same fundamental structure
exists. “It comprises two equally essential elements: on the
one hand, the acts of the man who undergoes conversion
through the action of the Holy Spirit: namely,
contrition, confession, and satisfaction; on the
other, God’s action through the intervention of the
Church.” CCC 1448

There are four essential elements to this sacrament:

l.) Contrition--sorrow for one’s sins with a
determination to avoid sin in the future. This is not
a matter of feelings. It is a matter of will.

2.) Confession (disclosure) of one’s sins--with the
admission of our sins, we take responsibility for
them. The penitent opens himself/herself again to God
and the Church in the person of the priest in order to
make a new future possible. Before confessing one’s
sins, there is need for an examination of conscience
that requires a certain on-going formation of
conscience. The number and types of sins should be
stated. “All mortal sins of which penitents after a
diligent self-examination are conscious must be
recounted by them in confession...”CCC1456 “Without
being strictly necessary, confession of everyday
faults (venial sins) is nevertheless strongly
recommended by the Church.” CCC 1458 The catechism is
also clear on the following point: “‘after having
attained the age of discretion, each of the faithful
is bound by an obligation faithfully to confess
serious sins at least once a year.’ Anyone who is
aware of having committed a mortal sin must not
receive Holy Communion, even if he experiences deep
contrition, without having first received sacramental
absolution, unless he has a grave reason for receiving
Communion and there is no possibility of going to
confession. Children must go to the sacrament of
Penance before receiving Holy Communion for the first
time.” CCC 1457

3.) Absolution—given by the priest “he sets us free
from our sins, using the power that Christ entrusted
to the Church and by which he pardons the sins of the
penitent.” USCCA 240 With absolution, there is an
assurance that our sins are forgiven.

4.) Satisfaction (Penance)--something the penitent is
called to do by the confessor to atone for his or her
sins. It is also referred to as penance. It is
intended to assist in the healing and not be punitive.
There is often a communitarian dimension since so many
of our sins affect others also and harm must be
repaired. “Just as when we get physically out of
shape, we need to take up some exercise, so also when
the soul is morally out of shape, there is the
challenge to adopt spiritual exercises that will
restore it.” USCCA 240

I wish to invite those of you who have not received
the healing grace of the sacrament of reconciliation
in a long time to come, to open the door to this
sacrament of Jesus’ healing mercy. Come in and be not
afraid! For those of you who receive the sacrament
regularly, I encourage you to continue and to talk
about it with others. Encourage them. Bring them with
you to the sacrament. It is a wonderful spiritual work
of mercy, of genuine act of charity to bring someone
back to this sacrament--particularly a family member.
Before concluding our meditation, a word about the
other healing sacrament, the Sacrament of Anointing of
the Sick. The fruits of Jesus’ passion and death
continue through signs and words in our day, above all
in the Eucharist, but also in that special anointing
sacrament of the sick. It is the sacrament that
unites us--in special fashion-- with the passion of Christ.
It is a sacrament that must be rediscovered in our
day. It is up to each of us to call the priest if a
person is seriously ill or near death or suffering the
difficulties of old age.

Only a priest or bishop may administer this sacrament
using blessed oil by the bishop at the Chrism Mass.
The anointing includes the forehead and hands of the
sick person. The hoped-for effect is that the person
will be physically healed if it is God’s will. But
importantly, “the gifts of this Sacrament include
uniting the sick person with Christ’s Passion, for the
person’s well-being and that of the Church; strength
to endure patiently the sufferings of illness and old
age; the forgiveness of sins if the person was unable
to receive the Sacrament of Penance; and preparation
for the passage to eternal life.” USCCA 257-58

A blessed continuation of Lent 2008!