The most common risk for the sacraments in today’s society is to trivialize them. Marriage is reduced to a great feast; communion to a social rite of passage together with companions; baptism to a presentation of the newborn to his circle of acquaintances and friends; Anointing of the sick to the blessing in the point of death, when a person has only a few moments of life left: almost a desperate attempt to wipe his soul with a cloth, often during a state of unconsciousness, before he goes. 

The Pope’s decision to dedicate his July prayer intention precisely to the Anointing of the Sick is intended to help us understand the true meaning of this sacrament. He defines it as “one of the ‘sacraments of healing,’ of ‘care,’ which heals the spirit” and reiterates that its recipients are not only “those who are about to die,” but in general the elderly and also people preparing to undergo delicate surgery. With his words, he tries to return the Anointing of the Sick to a framework of normality – old age and illness are part of the life of each of us – and not to an extreme condition: it is not, in short, the train’s safety alarm, to sound when everything seems compromised or about to succumb. 

People of different ages and physical conditions are also the protagonists of the video that accompanies Francis’ words: on the one hand, there is an elderly man, reached at home by a priest called by his wife; on the other hand, there is a much younger man, who receives the sacrament outdoors, in a moment of recollection and prayer with his large family. In both cases, the sick person is not alone, but surrounded by the affection of those who love him: because in the Anointing of the Sick, as Francis emphasizes, the Lord becomes present not only for the people who receive it, but also for their loved ones.

Andrea Sarubbi

Coordinator The Pope’s Video