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The Power of Sacramentals

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As Jesus entered the town of Bethsaida, some people there brought to Him a man who was born blind and asked Him to heal Him.  Jesus took some spittle and rubbed it in his eyes, but it effected only a partial healing.  The man could only see shapes.  It was not until He laid His hands upon the man that the man was able to see clearly (c.f. Mark 8:22-27).  This event has often plagued Biblical commentators who have struggled to interpret it.  At first glance it appears that Jesus was somehow limited in His power to heal, having to do it in stages.  But those who are familiar with the Catholic practice of using Sacramentals will recognize it for what it is, an institution of sorts of the practice.  The man receives the grace of healing after the man has been properly disposed after coming in contact with a consecrated object. It is with this in mind, that we shall discuss the Church’s use of Sacramentals.

Theology of Sacramentals

Any discussion of Sacramentals must begin with making an important distinction between Sacramentals and Sacraments.  As the Catechism puts it, “Sacramentals do not confer the grace of the Holy Spirit in the way that the Sacraments do, but by the Church’s prayer, they prepare us to receive grace and dispose us to cooperate with it” (CCC 1671).  Sacramentals do not work ex opere operato the way Sacraments do, but instead their efficacy comes from the intercessory power of the Church.  In short they do not bestow sanctifying grace but only aid in disposing the person to receive them.

Because the efficacy rests upon the intercessory power of the Church, unlike Sacraments which were instituted by Christ, Sacramentals are instituted by the Church.  By bestowing a prayer of consecration over the object, it becomes a means by which those who use them become disposed to the infusion of sanctifying grace.  The specific grace of the Sacramental depends upon the prayer itself, a prayer that is said by a Priest but has the entire Church.  The consecrated object is given a power to effect a certain blessing, although it is not infallible as with the Sacraments.  Nevertheless, Sacramentals are a powerful help in the pursuit of sanctity.  This is what makes Sacramentals so powerful.  But they are also made powerful through the intercessory power of the whole Church.  In this way they are different from having someone pray for you.  If, as St. James says, “the prayer of a righteous man is indeed powerful and effective” (James 5:16), then the prayer of the whole Church, the spotless Bride of Christ is much greater.

St. Thomas in his Theology of the Sacraments says that the existence of Sacramentals is fitting because none of the Seven Sacraments “was instituted directly against venial sin. This is taken away by certain sacramentals, for instance, Holy Water and such like” (ST III q.65, art.1, ad.8).  This “supplementary power” placed upon some Sacramentals is a key point to grasp in their use so as to keep us from treating them like good luck charms.  They each contain a certain power that comes from the prayer of consecration by which they were made to be Sacramentals.

Some Examples of Sacramentals

Using St. Thomas’ example, this power to take away venial sins is bestowed upon Holy Water because it was specifically consecrated for that purpose by the prayer of consecration:

Blessed are you, Lord, all-powerful God, who in Christ, the living water of salvation, blessed and transformed us.  Grant that, when we are sprinkled with this water or make use of it, we will be refreshed inwardly by the power of the Holy Spirit and continue to walk in the new life we received at baptism.  We ask this through Christ our Lord.

A blessed crucifix is effective in providing both bodily and spiritual protection, especially “against the cruel darts of the enemy” (1962 Rituale Romanum).  Likewise, sacred images, be they of Our Lord, Our Lady, St. Joseph or any of the saints make available the merits and intercession of those who are depicted when a person pays devout homage to them.  In a very real way they make the person in the image immediately present to the person who seeks to speak with them.

Another important Sacramental, especially relevant to Lent is Palms.  As Dom Prosper Gueranger describes in his book The Liturgical Year, palms are blessed using “prayers that are are eloquent and full of instruction; and, together with the sprinkling with holy water and the incensation, impart a virtue to these branches, which elevates them to the supernatural order, and makes them means for the sanctification of our souls and the protection of our persons and dwellings.”   The palms act to give protection to houses and the people in them when they are kept there.  This is a reason why if palms are being offered, even if you can’t get to Mass, that you should seek them out.

Obviously then the efficacy of Sacramentals depends upon the blessing that has been bestowed upon them by the Priest.  When we ask for an object to be blessed then, we are not just asking to make it somehow holy but to have it set aside for a specific purpose.  We should always ask that the proper blessing be said over the object so that it can be used for the purpose that the Church puts forth.  Similarly, we should listen to the words of blessing so that we can learn exactly what the objects do.

The Divine Composer

Freedom, God's Will, Prayer,

If we were to encapsulate the teachings of the self-help gurus, then they would boil down to “never leave anything to chance.”  After all, at the heart of the self-help movement is, well, helping yourself, by taking control of your life and seizing the day.  The saints too would exhort us to never leave anything to chance.  But they would express this for a very different reason.  For the saints there is no such thing as chance.  Instead they would urge us to leave everything to Providence.  And it is this attitude that make them saints.  If we too want to join them in the Church Triumphant then it behooves us to study how the most practical of Christian doctrines, Providence, “works”.

Notice how any discussion of Providence will always have the idea of chance in its orbit.  To say that “there is no such thing as chance” might seem provocative at first, but once we unpack it then we will see that it must be profoundly true.  If any discussion of Providence cannot proceed without bumping into the notion of chance, then we must begin there. 

Toppling the Objections to Providence

On the one hand we know that pure chance, the notion that things “just happen” violates the principle of causality.  Everything that happens must have a cause.  Usually what we mean by chance then is when we cannot observe the causality or so many causes seemed to converge that the event was so unlikely that it had to be chance.  Labeling an event as chance really is a way in for us to admit that we cannot fully explain how an event happened.  But this leaves us with only two alternatives—either the causality was governed by some random force that we call chance or it is governed by God through His Providence.  Even if it is a tough pill for us to swallow in our empirical age, we must side with the saints in their choosing of the latter and their insistence that there is no such thing as chance.

This raises a second objection in that, by removing chance, it seems to also remove free will.  If everything is meticulously planned out, then how can there be freedom to choose?  But this is to confuse chance with contingency.  God’s Providence has left some things to necessity (like the Incarnation) and some things to contingency (like Mary’s cooperation).  But it is by His omnipotence that He governs the bringing about of the necessary things through contingent things (c.f ST I, q.22, a.4).  This bears some further explanation because it enables us to marvel more fully at God’s Providence.

Because God is the Creator of all things and, because He knows His own omnipotence, He can know all things that could happen or do happen because He is their ultimate cause.  So, despite leaving some things up to free will decisions, He can alter the events surrounding those decisions to suit His purpose.  This is not to suggest that He is constantly executing “Plan B”, but an admission that He foresaw all that was to happen.  Therefore, His eternal law is simply one plan.  Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange gives a useful example to demonstrate how this might work. 

Over time, the great composer Beethoven grew deaf but, despite not actually be able to hear them, was still able to compose beautiful pieces of music.  This was because he knew music not just in hearing it, but through its laws.  He could compose without audible experimentation because he knew how the notes would fit together and create harmony.  This higher way of knowing his music through the laws governing it made it unnecessary that he try all possible combinations of notes.  In knowing the law he, in a very real sense knew all possible combinations enabling him to say “these fit, these don’t” to every set of notes that entered his mind.   So too with God.  He knows the laws by which the universe is governed, even the “law” of free will by which our actions are presented to Him and thus can Providentially compose the world.

There is one final aspect that bears mention as well and that is the role of petitionary prayer.  Prayer is a gift from God meaning that true prayer is always inspired by God in order to conform our desires to the plans of Providence.  That is why the holiest of men and women, that is those who are most like God, willing what He wills, will always be the most effective of pray-ers.  In asking for what God intends to give, they are free instruments in the implementation of His plans.  Prayer then is one of the instrumental causes of Providence, perhaps the most powerful of all them.

The Laws of Divine Providence

The laws of God’s divine composition, which we call Providence, are essentially threefold.  First, nothing that happens is contrary to His purpose of Creation, namely, as a manifestation of His Goodness and the rational creature’s share in the revealed Glory of Christ.  Second, nothing that happens was not foreseen by God and willed either actively or permissively.  Finally, God sees to it that all things work to the spiritual benefit those who are called to be saints and persevere in His love (Romans 8:28).

At this point it is good to be reminded that the doctrine of Providence is practical.  Hidden within the word Providence is provide.  This means that although we make theological distinctions between God’s active and permissive will, in our daily living we should not make any such distinction.  We should see each and everything that happens as coming directly from the hand of God with the intent of providing for the spiritual needs of those who love Him.  And everything, means everything including our own sins.  God only allows us to fall if, in the end, it leads us towards being more fully invaded by grace. 

An example drawn from real life might help us bring all of this into relief.  Forgiveness, something most of us struggle with, is only possible with a firm belief in Providence.  Recall the story of Joseph the Patriarch.  When his brothers sought forgiveness he did not trivialize what they did nor did he forget it.  In fact, he remembered it and told them as such.  But he remembered it as it truly was, an instrument of Providence.  Joseph is the perfect model for the stance towards those that slight us.  When we submit to the plans of Divine Providence, we see those who harm us actually doing us a favor.  They become instruments in God’s Providential plan.  The “logic” is simple if we believe the laws of Providence elucidated above.  This does not mean we won’t suffer, but we are guaranteed to draw the fruit that God intended for us to receive when we submit to His will in it.  Our Lord was silent in the face of His oppressors precisely to win the grace for us to do the same.  Nor does it make what the person has done right.  It simply gives us a means by which we can move towards truly forgiving the other person.  Providence makes forgiveness possible and even easy.