Chapter VI. On The Subject Of The Sacraments

86. Notion. The subject of the sacraments is said to be the one who receives a sacrament and its effects.

General principle. The subject of the sacraments is man alone in the wayfaring state; nevertheless, not every man can receive all the sacraments.

Thus it is from the will of Christ. The reason for the first part is that man alone in the wayfaring state is capable of receiving sanctifying grace or its increase. For the angels and the souls of the departed are already at their terminus, and have immutably either acquired or lost eternal salvation. When the Eucharist is called the "bread of angels," it is by no means indicated that the angels receive the Eucharist as men do, but that the same Christ who is our food through the sacrament is, as it were, the sweetest and most efficacious food of the angels through the beatific vision.³²⁰ St. Paul³²¹ speaks of those who are baptized for the dead. These words are somewhat obscure, but no interpreter has judged that, according to St. Paul, those who died without baptism can receive the effect of baptism if someone living on earth were baptized in their place. St. Paul perhaps speaks of some superstitious and false rite then in use, or the sense is that those faithful are baptized so that they may rise with the dead unto eternal beatitude.

The reason for the other part of the principle is that not every man has the qualities required for all the sacraments. Thus a woman cannot validly receive the sacrament of order, nor can a healthy man receive the sacrament of extreme unction.

With these things premised, we treat first the valid and then the licit reception of the sacraments.

³²⁰ Cf. S. theol. 3, q. 80, a. 2 ad 1.

³²¹ 1 Cor. 15:29.