Studia Koszalińsko-Kołobrzeskie

The Church is the sacrament of salvation in communion and all the sacraments are the sacraments of communion – the Trinitarian economy of salvation liturgically realized in the seven evangelical signs that are in the nature of living communion between God and man. “New coming of Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit, and his constant presence and action in the spiritual life are accomplished in the sacramental reality. (…) The Church is the visible dispenser of the sacred signs, while the Holy Spirit acts in them as the invisible dispenser of the life which they signify. Together with the Spirit, Christ Jesus is present and acting. (…) The fullness of the salvific reality, which is Christ in history, extends in a sacramental way in the power of the Spirit Paraclete” (John Paul II, Dominum et Vivificantem, 61–64). The sacraments of the healing of communion are the Sacrament of Penance and the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick. Guilt and sin are disruptions of communication and wounds inflicted on communion. The Holy Spirit places people in the presence of Christ and enables them to know the truth so that they can live in harmony with it. The risen Christ calls us to conversion and change of thinking, and the initiative to seek and reach out to Christ belongs also to the Holy Spirit. The process of liberating man from the bondage of sin and iniquity is always done in the Sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation under the influence of the Holy Spirit, who purifies and transforms all with the fire of his presence. Everyone is at risk of disease and its consequence is exclusion of society. Early Christian prayers of consecration attribute the healing effect in the bodily and spiritual realms to the holy oil, which receives power from the Holy Spirit invoked in the epicletic prayer of the Church. The effect of receiving the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick is a special gift of the Holy Spirit – the grace of strengthening, peace and courage in overcoming the difficulties associated with a serious illness or inadequacy of old age, renewing trust and faith in God and strengthening against the temptations of the evil spirit, discouragement and fear of death, and healing of soul and body. The words from the Letter of St. James 5:14–15 were originally a prayer of intercession of the priests of the community over the sick, combined with the symbolic laying on of hands – the solidarity of the faithful in a communicative word and a non-verbal communication symbol aimed at asking God to save a seriously ill person from the sphere of death as a breakdown in communication and to prolong life in communion with God and people. The anointing prayer also concerns the survival of the sick beyond the borders of sickness and death in the life-giving Holy Spirit and in communion with the risen Christ. The anointing of the sick celebrates the universal presence of the mission of the Son and the Holy Spirit in man and in the Church beyond sickness and death.