Curacy

“ Is any one sick among you, let him bring in the Priests of the Church, and let him 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 will lift him up, and if he be in sin, his sins shall be forgiven him." (St. James, v.)
By Thy infinite goodness, Jesus, through which Thou hast established this Holy Sacrament, I beseech Thee to purify me from my sins, defend me from the enemy, strengthen me in temptation, and give me a happy end; or, if it be profitable for my soul's salvation, restore me to my former health. ”

“ I labour under such a complication of diseases that no human aid can avail me. Heal me, therefore, I beseech thee, in order to display, thy power, and show forth the glory of thy name. If the touch of thy garments, O my Saviour! whilst thou wert upon earth, cured all sorts of diseases, shall not thy most precious body and blood, which thou hast given me as food, produce the same wonderful effects?
But thou, my soul, who hast recourse to thy divine Physician for health, art thou sincerely desirous of being cured? ”

“ But if a man, either by reason of extremity of sickness, or for want of warning in due time to the curate, or for lack of company to receive with him, or by any other just impediment, do not receive the sacrament of Christ’s body and blood, the curate shall instruct him, that if he do truly repent him of his sins, and stedfastly believe that Jesus Christ hath suffered death upon the cross for him, and shed his blood for his redemption ”

“ He loves thy priests and sends them his gifts.' I also prayed for him in church before the altar of the Lord, at the Liturgy, during the prayer: 'Thou who hast given us grace at this time, with one accord to make our common supplication unto thee,' and before the Holy Mysteries themselves. I prayed in the following words: 'Lord, our life! It is as easy for thee to cure every malady as it is for me to think of healing. It is as easy for thee to raise every man from the dead as it is for me to think of the possibility of the resurrection of the dead. ”

“ For the sick whom Thou chastenest in Thy love I offer up my prayers; heal their sickness if it be expedient for them. May it do Thy work in their souls, that they be not chastened in vain. May they look up to Thee, and turn to Thee with a new heart, and repent upon their beds, and in their patience shew forth the fruits of repentance. May their sickness be received as an angel into their house; may they entertain it as an angel and minister of grace; when it shall depart may they remember that they have had an angel, and consider the message wherewith it was sent unto their souls. ”

“ The grace of the Father, the mercy of the Son, and the hovering of the Holy Spirit, the Third Person, be our help every day. Our help is in Thee. In Thee, our true Physician, is our hope. Put the medicine of Thy mercy on our wounds, and bind up our bruises that we be not lost. Without Thy help we are powerless to keep Thy commandments. ”

“ Christ’s view of healing is relative to His view of disease,185 His view of disease to His view of human nature. Had he attached to bodily health the supreme importance which it is the tendency of our day to assign to it, and regarded bodily pain as a thing at all costs to be effaced, we must suppose that His whole Life upon earth would have been devoted to the relief of sickness and pain, and that the ‘Healing Ministry’ of His Church would have been far more clearly defined. But no more does He abolish disease than He abolishes pauperism. ”

“ XLIII. A Place of Healing for Souls
1.THERE is a wondrous fountain of health — a marvelous place of healing for souls, which derives its efficacy from the precious blood of Jesus Christ; it is the sacrament of Penance. May you ever be filled in an increasing degree with veneration, and, I had almost said, with holy enthusiasm, for this place of healing for souls.
Picture to yourself a man who, having committed a grievous sin, knows nothing of the sacrament of Penance. He looks into himself, is conscious of the magnitude of his transgression, and the wretched state into which he has fallen. ”

“ Faith healing still played a large part in the cure of Middle Age maladies, and so deeply-rooted was the idea that prayer and intercession, combined with a concoction of herbs from the monastery gardens, would heal the sick, that it was deemed a want of faith to employ other remedies. "It is better," they said, "to fall into the hands of God than into the hands of men," a beneficial reflection, when one considers for a moment what the "hands of men" meant. ”

“ For by thee does our Saviour say to him who is discouraged under the sense of his sins, “Thy sins are forgiven thee: thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace.” [68] But this peace and haven of tranquillity is the Church of Christ, into which do thou, when thou hast loosed them from their sins, restore them, as being now sound and unblameable, of good hope, diligent, laborious in good works. As a skilful and compassionate physician, heal all such as have wandered in the ways of sin; for “they that are whole have no need of a physician, but they that are sick. ”

“ I rejoice in knowing that I myself stand here today a living witness to the healing power of Almighty God, that is in the Church of Christ. Given up by eight doctors to die, yet under the inspiration of the Spirit of God, the man who is now the prophet of God, on the earth, said as he blessed me that I should live, and I do live, notwithstanding the doctors said that blood poisoning in the third and last stage had set in, in my case. ”

“ Then, like blind Bartimeus, the doubting heart looks up through faith, and your patient rejoices in the gospel of health.
Thus, you see, it is easier to heal the physical than the moral ailment. When divine Truth and Love heal, of sin, the sinner who is at ease in sin, how much more should these heal, of sickness, the sick who are dis-eased, dis-comforted, and who long for relief! ”

“ How are we to heal others? First, by keeping in good spiritual health ourselves, lest we be told: ^Physician, heal thyself! ' By lives of regularity, by regular prayer, and regular sacraments; by lives that keep ever in touch with God, that look to God, that are spent in His presence, and are filled with work done for His cause. Thus shall we spread the light of truth, and make the force of good example felt: thus shall we make a protest against the disease of sin, and reparation to the Sacred Heart. ”

“ The best kind of prayer seeks not and asks not for physical relief or benefit, but opens the heart to its maker, and so receives the cure of peace that is a greater miracle than any yet wrought by man. Under the influence of that cure the sick are well and the dead are alive again. With the courage and spirit of such a cure in our lives, we shall inevitably do our utmost to relieve, by any good means, the physical suffering of the world. ”

“ The pains of sinful sense are less harmful than its pleasures. Belief in material suffering causes mortals to retreat from their error, to flee from body to Spirit, and to appeal to divine sources outside of themselves.
The Bible contains the recipe for all healing. “The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.” The leaves of healing Sin and sickness are both healed by the same Principle. The tree is typical of man's divine Principle, which is equal to every emergency, offering full salvation from sin, sickness, and death. ”

“ These divine remedies purify the soul from her sins, and increase her treasure of sanctifying grace; they fortify the sick person, and enable him to bear his sufferings with patience, to triumph over the assaults of the demon at the last moment, and to make a generous sacrifice of his life to God. Moreover, besides the effects which they produce upon the soul, the Sacraments exert a salutary influence upon the body. Extreme Unction especially comforts the sick person and alleviates his sufferings; it even restores him to health, if God judges it expedient for his salvation. ”

“ The gospel of healing demonstrates the law of Love. Justice uncovers sin of every sort; and mercy demands that if you see the danger menacing others, you shall, Deo volente, inform them thereof. Only thus is the right practice of Mind-healing achieved, and the wrong practice discerned, disarmed, and destroyed. ”

“ If there be any man wicked because his curate teacheth him not, his blood shall be required at the curate’s hands.—Latimer, Sermons, p. 525.
Henry the Second of England commanded all prelates and curates to reside upon their dioceses and charges.—Bishop Taylor, Ductor Dubitantium, b. iii. c. 1.
Curate, a parson or vicar, one that serves a cure, or has the charge of souls in a parish.—Phillips, New World of Words. ”

“ Inner harmony was restored. They find the man ‘sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind.’ The bodily and the mental well-being are combined in the cure. The sufferer’s enfeebled will is braced up to respond to the Will of the Healer, that ease shall expel disease. Within the man’s being, as truly as without it, ‘imperavit ventis, et facta est tranquillitas magna.’65
(iii) An analysis of the miracles of Christ indicates His attitude towards the material and outward means, on which the physician still so largely relies. ”

“ Again, to speak nothing of the Sin against the Holy Ghost, whose cure not onely, but whose nature is unknown; I can cure the Gout or Stone in some, sooner than Divinity Pride or Avarice in others. I can cure Vices by Physick, when they remain incurable by Divinity; and shall obey my Pills, when they contemn their precepts. I boast nothing, but plainly say, we all labour against our own cure; for death is the cure of all diseases. ”

“ In that Divine fellowship we shall be able to pray for the true health and recovery of our sick people. ‘The prayer of faith shall save the sick,’ for faith implies a whole-hearted acceptance of the Will of God195 for the uncertain future. This gives a man the tranquillity of soul which is no less needed for prayer than for action. ”

“ In the early days of the Church, religious were called by a name which signifies healers. Oh! my daughter, be truly your own healer, and pay no heed to what self-love may whisper to the contrary. Say to yourself, since I do not wish to die spiritually, I will be healed, and in order to be healed I will submit to treatment and correction, and I will entreat the doctors to spare me nothing which may be required to effect my cure. ”

“ O Christ our Lord, who art the Physician of salvation, grant unto all who are sick the aid of heavenly healing. Look upon all faithful people who are sick and who love to call upon Thy name, and take their souls into Thy keeping, and vouchsafe to deliver them from all sickness and infirmity; through Jesus Christ. ”

“ Therefore let us pray that high physician, our blessed Saviour Christ, whose holy manhood God ordained for our necessity, to cure our deadly wounds with the medicine made of the most wholesome blood of his own blessed body. ”

“ But the issues of death are in thy hand, and our eyes are towards thee. In vain are all means, all medicines, if thou impart not the healing virtue. Thy weeping servants seek the healing virtue from thy waters, thy seas, thy pure air. All nature is in thy hand and ministers thy pleasure ”

“ What is this healing prayer? A mere Prayer for the sick. request that God will heal the sick has no power to gain more of the divine presence than is always at hand. The only beneficial effect of such prayer for the sick is on the human mind, making it act more powerfully on the body, through a blind faith in God. ”

“ Hospitals are needed that heal in the name of Christ, that heal ills of the body and at the same time by the spirit of love that permeates, by the Christian spirit that animates all connected with them, cure the ills of the soul and send the sufferers away rejoicing in spirit as well as in body, with a brighter outlook on the world and increased faith in humankind. ”

“ When I lay hands on the sick, I expect the healing power and influence of God to pass through me to the patient, and the disease to give way. I do not say that I heal everybody I lay hands on; but many have been healed under my administration. ”

“ It shall come to life, and gradually mend and be cured, and grow from strength to strength, as a sick man mends day by day after a deadly illness, slowly it may be, but surely:—for how can you fail of being cured if your physician is none other than Jesus Christ your Lord and your God? ”

“ Why, let us not speak of them; for though it is a great thing that their bodies should be healed, and they should go through the community singing the praises of Him who had restored them, there are better things to speak of—the healing of men's souls, the purifying of their spirits. ”

“ If we expect to be well, spiritually or naturally, we must strive to know and obey the laws of health and life.
Temptations by evil spirits permitted and controlled by the Lord for the sake of removing many spiritual evils, and a corresponding action of homoeopathic remedies administered by a skillful hand, for the sake of removing natural diseases, are curative methods which belong to the New Jerusalem Dispensation, now descending from God out of heaven, making all things new—the Church of the future. ”

“ Flinging herself on her knees before him she besought his prayers and blessing. In fact, stung by intolerable suffering she asked him to cure her. 'My dear child, you ask me what no mortal has power to do. The power to cure rests alone with God. ”

“ Where our critic loses faith in God to heal the sick, we cannot follow him, neither can we plant ourself on his material platform, and heal. We were a member of the Orthodox Church when a child, but our own and other people's prayers failed to heal us, until we learned the spiritual sense of a creed and discarded its material sense, left the dead rite for the living, palpitating presence of Christ, Truth, whereby to heal the sick. ”