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EXTREME UNCTION

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Originally appearing in Volume V10, Page 90 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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EXTREME See also:

UNCTION , a See also:sacrament of the See also:Roman See also:Catholic See also:Church. In See also:James v. 14 it is ordained that, if any believer is sick, he shall See also:call for the elders of the church; and they shall pray over him, See also:anointing him with oil in the name of the, See also:Lord; and the See also:prayer of faith. shall See also:save him that is sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, it shall be forgiven him. See also:Origen reprobated medical See also:art on the ground that the See also:prescription here cited is enough; See also:modern faith-healers and See also:Peculiar See also:People have followed in his See also:wake. The Catholic Church has more wisely See also:left physicians in. See also:possession, and elevated the anointing of the sick into a sacrament to be used only in cases of mortal sickness, and even then not to the exclusion of the healing art. It has been See also:general since the 9th See also:century. The See also:council of See also:Florence A.D. 1439 thus defined it: " The fifth sacrament is extreme unction. Its See also:matter is See also:olive oil, blessed by a See also:bishop. It shall not be given except to a sick See also:person whose See also:death is apprehended. He shall be anointed in the following places: the eyes, ears, nostrils, mouth, hands, feet, reins. The See also:form of the sacrament: is this: Through this anointing of thee and through its most pious See also:mercy, be forgiven all thy sins of sight, &c.

and so in respect of the other See also:

organs. A See also:priest can administer this sacrament. But its effect is to make whole the mind, and, so far as it is expedient, the See also:body as well." This sacrament supplements that of See also:penance (viz. remission of See also:post-baptismal See also:sin) in the sense that any See also:guilt unconfessed or left over after normal penances imposed by confessors is purged thereby. It was discussed in the 12th century whether this sacrament is indelible like See also:baptism, or whether it can be repeated; and the latter view, that of See also:Peter Lombard, prevailed. It was a ' popular See also:opinion in' the See also:middle ages that extreme unction extinguishes all ties and links with this See also:world, so that he who has received it must, if he recovers, renounce the eating of flesh and matrimonial relations. A few peasants of See also:Lombardy still believe that one who has received extreme unction ought to be left to See also:die, and that sick people may be starved to death through the withholding of See also:food on superstitious grounds. Such opinions, combated by bishops and See also:councils, were due to the See also:influence of the consolamentum of the See also:Cathars (q.v.). In both sacraments the death-See also:bed baptism of an earlier See also:age seems to survive, and they both fulfil a deep-seated need of the human to anoint the dead. In the Roman Church the bishop blesses the oil of the sick used in extreme unctions on See also:Holy See also:Thursday at the Chrismal See also:Mass,' using the following prayer of the sacramentaries of See also:Gelasius and See also:Hadrian: " Send forth, we pray Thee, 0 Lord, Thy holy spirit, the Paraclete from See also:Heaven, into this fatness of oil, which See also:Thou hast deigned to produce from the See also:green See also:wood for refreshment of mind and body; and through Thy holy See also:benediction may it be for all that anoint, See also:taste, See also:touch, a See also:protection of mind and body, of soul and spirit, unto the easing away of all See also:pain, all weakness, all sickness of mind and body; wherefore Thou hast anointed priest, See also:kings and prophets and' martyrs with thy See also:chrism, perfected by Thee, 0 Lord, blessed and abiding in our bowels in the name of our Lord Jesus See also:Christ." See L. See also:Duchesne, Origines du Culte Chretien (See also:Paris, 1898). (F. C.

C.) ' The oil left over from the See also:

year before is burnt. spirit. Some Gnostics sprinkled the heads of the dying with oil and See also:water to render them invisible to the See also:powers of darkness; but in the See also:East generally, where the need to compete with the Cathar sacrament of Consolatio was less acutely See also:felt, extreme unction is unknown. The Latinizing Armenians adopted it from See also:Rome in the crusading See also:epoch.

End of Article: EXTREME UNCTION

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