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/276

 as glance over these liturgies without being strongly impressed by the fact that those who framed them and used them had no notion of drawing any sharp line of distinction between the spiritual and the material, between the blessing of the soul and the good to be desired for the body. If they made intercession for the Church that it might be 'kept sheltered from storms' and be 'preserved founded upon the rock until the consummation of the world,' and were careful to remember the higher needs of all classes of Christian people, they were quick to add, 'Let us pray for our brethren exercised by sickness, that the Lord may deliver them from every disease and from every infirmity, and may restore them whole to His Holy Church.' In the prayer of Consecration they would ask that the Bread and the Wine might be made to all who received them a means of 'faith, and watchfulness, and healing, and sober-mindedness, and sanctification, and renovation of soul and body and spirit.' When they had partaken of the elements they implored that these might 'not be unto condemnation but to salvation, for the benefit of soul and body.'

Just ten years ago a very important