5:14–15 Is anyone sick among
you? Let him bring in the presbyters of the Church, and let them pray over him. Just as he had given advice to the one
who was sad, so he gives advice also to the one who is sick, how he should be
on his guard against the foolishness of murmuring, and according to the measure
of the wound he assigns as well the measure of the cure. He admonishes the one
who is sad to pray for himself and sing psalms, but commands the person who is
sick either in body or faith that as the blow he has suffered is greater he
should remember to cure himself with the help of more persons, and this of the presbyters;
and let him not report the reason for his weakness to the younger and less
learned, lest by chance he receive from them some harmful advice or counsel. And let them pray over him, he says, anointing him with oil in the name of the
Lord, and the prayer of faith will save the sick person. We read in the
Gospel that the apostles also did this. And now the custom of the Church holds
that those who are sick be anointed with consecrated oil by the presbyters,
with the prayer that goes with this, that they may be cured. Not only for the
presbyters, but, as Pope Innocent writes, even for all Christians is it lawful
to use the same oil for anointing at their own necessity or that of their
[relatives], but the oil may be consecrated only by bishops. For what he says, with oil in the name of the Lord, means
with oil consecrated in the name of the Lord or at least that when they anoint
the sick person they ought also to invoke the name of the Lord over him at the
same time. And if he [has committed]
sins, they will be forgiven him. Many persons on account of sins committed
in the soul are struck with sickness or even death of the body. Hence the
apostle says to the Corinthians, because they had been accustomed to receive
the body of the Lord unworthily, Therefore,
many among you are sick and weak and many have fallen asleep. If,
therefore, the sick [have committed] sins and have confessed them to the
presbyters of the Church and have sincerely tried to leave them behind and to
amend, these will be forgiven them. But sins cannot be forgiven without a firm
promise of amendment. (The Commentary on the Seven Catholic
Epistles of Bede the Venerable [trans. David Hurst; Cistercian Studies Series
82; Kalamazoo, Mich.: Cistercian Publications, 1985], 61-62)