Page:Medicine and the church; being a series of studies on the relationship between the practice of medicine and the church's ministry to the sick (IA medicinechurchbe00rhodiala).pdf/274

 morbid physical conditions to moral wrongdoing and the presence of spiritual forces of evil. The great word 'Salvation' strictly interpreted meant health; and it was applied to both body and soul. It is no small part of Christ's redemption to 'quicken your mortal bodies through His Spirit that dwelleth in you.'

The fact that the body has its appointed part and share in the Holy Communion is in itself significant of the honour to be paid to it, and might be taken to imply that it too is to be partaker of the benefit. And when St. Paul declares that to receive 'unworthily' is to be in danger of bodily sickness and even of death, we can scarcely avoid the inference that for the worthy recipient there might be expected some corresponding advantage of quickened health and physical vitality.

If we ask what the thoughts of early Christianity were in regard to this matter, we need remain in no uncertainty as to the reply. Recent discovery of documents and the critical study of the primitive liturgies have given us a great deal of knowledge as to the religious conceptions of those who met for Christian worship in the centuries after the Apostles.