Chapter I. The Nature of Extreme Unction

THE Council of Trent defined that Extreme Unction is a true sacrament of the New Law insinuated by St Mark and promulgated and recommended to the faithful by St James when he wrote: “Is any man sick among you? Let him bring in the priests of the Church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord: and the prayer of faith shall save the sick man; and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he be in sins they shall be forgiven him.”¹

This sacrament, as the Council of Trent also teaches, is the complement or completion of Penance. As we have seen, Penance was specially instituted for the remission of postbaptismal sin, and its reception is necessary for all Christians who have fallen into grave sin after Baptism. Penance, then, ordinarily precedes Extreme Unction, which is properly a sacrament of the living; its primary effect is to infuse sanctifying grace into the soul for the salvation of the sick man. If any sins still remain on the soul, provided that there be at least attrition for them, they will be remitted together with the remains of sin. By the remains of sin are understood the temporal punishment due to them, spiritual weakness and inclination to evil, lethargy in the doing of good. The sacrament removes these wholly or in part, according to the dispositions of the recipient, and, moreover, if it be for the good of the sick person and in keeping with the providence of God, it restores him to bodily health. This last effect is not produced by miracle, but by means of natural causes; the sacrament consoles and soothes the sick person, dispels his mental anxieties, and the resultant state, with the blessing of God, sometimes brings about a recovery. In order to produce this effect with more certainty the administration of the sacrament should not be too long deferred.

¹ Jas. v 14, 15.

The remote matter of Extreme Unction is olive oil blessed by a bishop for the purpose, or by a priest who has received power to bless it from the Holy See (Can. 945). Ecclesiastical law requires that priests obtain the oil of the sick from their own ordinary, not from any other Bishop.

The proximate matter is the anointing with oil of the principal organs of the senses, and where the organs are double both are anointed, the right one first. In England, according to the Ritual, the eyes, ears, nostrils, mouth, hands, and feet, are anointed; but when the recipient is a woman in a public infirmary or hospital, the priest has special leave to omit the anointing of the feet if he thinks that it would excite scandal or comment. According to Canon 947, sec. 3, the anointing of the feet may be omitted for any reasonable cause.

If some sense-organ is wanting, the part of the body nearest to where it should be is anointed. Each anointing has its own special form, that for the eyes being: “ By this holy anointing and through his most sweet mercy may the Lord forgive whatever sins thou hast committed through thy sight. Amen.” The form for the other senses is similar. If the near approach of death will not allow of all the senses being anointed with their appropriate forms, the forehead may be anointed with the following general form: “ By this holy anointing may the Lord forgive whatever sins thou hast committed. Amen.”¹ As, however, Extreme Unction is only probably valid when administered with such a single anointing under one general form, if there is time it should be repeated immediately in the form prescribed by the Ritual.

¹ S.O., April 25, 1906; can. 947, sec. I.