Seven Holy Things, by John Carberry

Why are there seven sacraments in the Catholic Church? Many of the protestant sects
questioned what the Catholics held as sacraments in the sixteenth century. Why do you need a
priest to forgive your sins? Who can give a priest authority? How can the presence of God in
the Holy Eucharist be real? What purpose does anointing the sick do? While many questions
were raised, the protestors to the Catholic faith did not really address any of the answers to their
own questions. Instead, they merely discontinued practicing or acknowledging many of these
sacraments. It was only in the Council of Trent (1545-1564) that a deep study was performed of
the sacraments, and this study was performed by Catholic pastors (bishops), or shepherds of the
Church, to address the Protestant questions.

When we think of the number seven, we usually liken it to the length of a week. God
created the universe in 6 days and on the seventh day he rested. Jesus did most of his salvific
work on the sixth day (Friday), he rested in the tomb on Saturday, and rose from the dead on the
eighth day, or Sunday. The Father begins his physical creation on a Sunday, while Jesus’
spiritually saves us through his Resurrection on a Sunday. The number seven was common
throughout the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament). Every seven years a sabbatical year was set aside
for complete rest of the ground (Lv 25:1-4). After a week of weeks of years, seven times seven,
a Jubilee year was set aside and celebrated as a year of forgiveness and liberty for the inhabitants
(Lv 25:10-12).1 The last seven commandments deal with love of neighbor. God gives Noah
seven days to assemble the animals to take on the ark (Gn 7:4). Noah takes seven pairs of clean
animals on the ark (Gn 7:2-3). During the time of Moses and Aaron, the priest was to sacrifice a
Red Heifer and sprinkle the blood seven times toward the front of the meeting tent (Nm 19:4),
which was adorned inside by seven lamps (Ex 25:37). In Isaiah, the sevenfold strength of the
sun is like the light of seven days (Is 30:26). There were seven major churches in the province of
Asia making up the early Church (Rv 1:4, 11). Saint Thomas Aquinas indicates that the seven
times corresponds either to the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost or to the seven days wherein all
time is comprised.2 There are seven virtues when the Theological Virtues of faith, hope and love
(1 Cor 13:13) are combined with the cardinal or hinge virtues of prudence, fortitude, temperance
and justice (Wis 8:7). There are seven corporal works of mercy and seven spiritual works of
mercy.3 Corporal derives from the Latin term corpus, which means body, because they deal with
the material needs of persons. There are seven gifts of the Holy Spirit (Is 11:2-4).4 John begins
his discussion of Jesus’ ministry with the miracle at Cana where Jesus turns six stone jars of
water into wine (Jn 2:6). The seventh jar of wine is reserved for the conclusion of Christ’s
ministry, immediately before his death (Jn 19:29). Christ’s redemptive work is completed. His
Sabbath rest can now begin. Perhaps the seven is representative of our lives where we should
carry out God’s will each day of the week until the end when we hope God will reward us with
eternal rest in heaven, like his heavenly rest after his completion of creation (Heb 4:4-11).5

Why did Christ institute the sacraments? Hugh of Saint Victor (1096-1141) was a mystic
theologian and writer in the twelfth century. In one of his books, On the Sacraments of the
Christian Faith, Hugh discusses the reasons for instituting the sacraments. According to Hugh,
Christ instituted the sacraments for three reasons: on account of humiliation, instruction, and
exercise. Since man disobeyed his superior, God, and subjected himself to those things below
him, the forbidden fruit and Satan, he became subject to these inferior things of the world
through concupiscence. Since man abandoned God through pride,6 he must now seek him
through humility. God instructs the human mind to recognize the invisible virtue through the
visible things of the earth (Rom 1:20, Ps 8:4, 19:2, Sir 17:8-10, Is 40:26, Acts 14:17, 17:26-29).
These signs and matter stimulate the mind of man and restore his communion with God. Man
exercises his relationship with God by carrying out what God has provided him to cultivate and
make fertile the multiple fruits with himself.7

If the sacraments represent holy things given to us by Christ, then we must elevate the
underlying holy things that Jesus uses. The Roman Catechism teaches us that “In order to exist,
to preserve existence, and to contribute to his own and to the public good, seven things seem
necessary to man: to be born, to grow, to be nurtured, to be cured when sick, when weak to be
strengthened; as far as regards the public welfare, to have magistrates invested with authority to
govern, and to perpetuate himself and his species by legitimate offspring.”8

The underlying holy thing in baptism is life. We are born from above or reborn in
Baptism (Jn 3:3). This sacrament initiates us, or starts us, in the Christian faith. When we are
born, we show our physical life for all to witness. When we are reborn in the Spirit through
Baptism, our new spiritual life is witnessed by all who are present at our Baptism. Our spiritual
life and our reconnection with God begin. Baptism is derived from the Greek term baptizein
which means to wash, plunge, immerse or dip.9 It represents our death to sin and our rising to
eternal life. Life is holy both physically and spiritually. Not destroying life is naturally
ingrained into our souls. God admonishes Cain for killing his brother, Abel: “Your brother’s
blood cries out to me from the ground” (Gn 4:9). This natural law applies only to human life
(Gn 9:3-6), and it forms the basis for the Fifth Commandment: “You shall not kill” (Ex 20:13, Dt
5:17). However, it applies at every stage of life, from the womb10 until natural death. The
interpretation of the command forbids euthanasia11 and capital punishment (Gn 4:15, Jn 8:3-
11).12 Just as the physical life of a person must be respected from conception to natural death, so too must the spiritual life be given respect (Mt 18:6-7). This is done by the parents or the
sponsors when they teach the faith to the one baptized or to be baptized. Destruction of the
spiritual life by false teaching or the failure to teach is evil, just as the taking of a physical life.
Growth or maturity is the holy thing of Confirmation. For Saint Thomas Aquinas, a thing
is not perfected at once from the outset, but through an orderly succession of time (Mk 8:22-
25).13 Pope Saint Paul VI tells us that the Church seeks to deepen, consolidate, nourish and
make even more mature the faith of the faithful, or believers, in order that they may be so still
more.14 To establish the truth of Jesus Christ, one must be mature enough (Eph 4:13, 1 Cor 2:6,
Col 3:10, Heb 6:14-15) to understand God’s word and make a personal decision regarding him.
One must personally mature in the faith to acknowledge Jesus as Lord. Christ stated that he
would acknowledge everyone who acknowledges him and deny those who deny him (Mt 10:32-
33, Mk 8:38, Lk 9:26, 12:8-9, 2 Tm 2:12, Rv 3:5, Jer 5:11-12).15 The gifts of the Holy Spirit
which accompany the Sacrament of Confirmation all require development (Is 11:1-4): wisdom,
understanding, counsel, strength, knowledge, piety and fear of the Lord. Wisdom means making
proper choices. Understanding means to relate the teaching to the practical world. Council is to
teach or be taught. Strength or fortitude means to forgo the worldly lures and practices and to
uphold godly ways. Knowledge comes when one seeks out the truth. Piety or holiness is acting
like Christ. Fear of the Lord results when we humbly recognize that Jesus will judge us on what
we have done and what we have failed to do. This fear begins with recognition of right and
wrong in God’s eyes. This holy thing has many names: growth, development, progress, maturity
or improvement. How do we grow in the aspect of faith? “Ask, and it will be given you; search,
and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you” (Mt 7:7, Lk 11:9-13, Prv 2:1-11,
3:13, 8:17, Lam 3:25, Sir 3:29, 39:1-3, 1 Kgs 3:5-13, 2 Chr 15:2-4, Jb 35:13, Ps 1:2, 4:2-4, 40:17, 70:5, 138:3, Jer 29:12-14, Dn 10:12, Am 5:4-6, Zep 2:3, Zec 8:22).16

The holy thing of the Eucharist is love. Christ nurtured us by feeding us with his own
body and blood. Christ loved us by giving up his life for us to save us from our sins and
presented us with this sacrament. The Mass brings together this physical and spiritual
sustenance of his body and blood with his Word. Jesus is truly present in the Eucharist (Jn 6:53).
By partaking of the Eucharist, Jesus becomes present within us as well as with those others who
receive Him. We therefore have a communion or a common union with our fellow Catholics.
Love means willing the good for another. Therefore, we must demonstrate our love for each
other to show our love for God. Whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen, cannot
claim to love God whom he has not seen (1 Jn 4:11-12, 20). Love often involves sacrifice.
Therefore, when we sacrifice our own interest for the interest of another, we demonstrate love
just as Christ sacrificed His life for us.

The English poet Alexander Pope wrote: “To err is human, to forgive is divine.”  Confession heals us of our spiritual ailments. It begins with our own recognition of our faults, which is often the hardest part. We then confess our sins to a priest and perform the satisfaction
or penance that the priest prescribes. The priest offers us absolution for the sins that we have
committed and confessed to him. Forgiveness is not an easy concept to accept, especially when
we are asked to forgive others who have done us wrong. But forgiveness is a good and holy
thing. Recognition of our sins requires repentance or rethinking our past actions. Only through
this recognition can we come to confess what we have done or have failed to do. Saint John Paul
II says that the unforgivable sins against the Holy Spirit (Mt 12:31-32, Mk 3:28-29, Lk 12:10)
include the refusal to accept forgiveness, what we sometimes call despair (or hopelessness), and
when a person rejects redemption and claims to have a right to persist in evil, what we refer to as
presumption (Heb 10:29, Jn 9:41, 15:22, Lk 18:9-14, Gn 11:6, Dt 17:12, Sir 5:1-8, 13:8, 32:17,
Nm 12:1-15, 16:1-3, 31-35, 1 Sm 15:10-29, 2 Chr 33:10, Jer 6:10, 8:6, 12, 15:18, Ez 8:17-18).17 We therefore need to reconcile our ways with God’s ways, which are often very different (Is 55:8-9, 65:2, Jb 11:7-9, Wis 9:9, Rom 11:33-34, Mi 4:12).

Anointing of the Sick can involve both physical and spiritual healing. While most would
agree that healing is good, many would disagree if we stated that suffering is a good and holy
thing. But one cannot explain healing without pondering over the concept of suffering. Clearly
if Christ was able to heal so many, God has the power to eliminate suffering all together. Why
does it remain? It must have a purpose. “More than anything else, it is the problem of suffering
which challenges faith and puts it to the test.”18 The general origin of illness and suffering is sin,
but the particular causes can be many: punishment (Ex 20:5, Nm 14:34, Dt 7:10, 11:17, 28,
28:15-69, 29:15-28, Jos 24:20, 2 Chr 6:26, 2 Mc 7:18-19, 32, 8:11, Ps 38:3, 89:31-33, Eccl 8:11, Wis 12:14, Sir 39:28-30, Is 1:19-20, 13:11, 26:16-21, Jer 19:3-5, 30:11-15, 46:28, 51:5, Bar 4:6, Ez 5:8-17, 14:13, 21, Rom 1:18, 3:5-6, 2 Thes 1:8-9, Rv 16:6),19 discipline (Dt 8:5, 11:2, 2 Mc 6:12-16, 7:33, Is 26:16, 21, 27:1, Jer 36:3, Jb 5:17-18, Wis 12:2, 2 Cor 7:10, Heb 12:6), redemption (Jer 31:11, Rom 8:17, 2 Cor 1:5, Phil 1:29, 2 Thes 1:5-6),20 tests of strength or a trial (Dt 8:2, 16, 13:4, Ex 20:20, 2 Chr 32:31, Tb 12:14, 2 Mc 7:40, Jb 1:7, Ps 7:10, 66:10-11, Heb 2:18, 4:15, 1 Pt 2:19-21, Jdt 8:25-27, Wis 3:5, Is 48:10, Zec 13:9),21 mastery of one’s appetites or fortitude (Dt 8:3), unleashing love in the human person (Jn 16:21),22 or manifesting (showing) God’s power and love (Jn 9:3, Ex 9:16). One can see the consequences of suffering when one looks at World War II. It was only after the war concluded that we see a restoration of the faith and a return from the moral decline of the earlier years. The consequences of evil were obvious during this war. It was only after we viewed these consequences that we became strengthened in the way, the truth and the life (Jn 14:6).

Holy Orders may be the least administered and yet one of the most important of the
sacraments. The good thing that it promotes is authority. The word authority derives from the
Latin auctor (originator) and the English author. Basically, God, the source of the rules, is the
one we are required to obey. The Church is formed as a hierarchy (Greek-hierarkhes-sacred
ruler), with the pope leading, then cardinals (who elect the new popes), bishops (or overseers),
priests (those who offer sacrifice), deacons (servants or those who perform service), and finally
the laity (unordained). Leadership provides order (1 Cor 14:40, Ti 1:5, Prv 28:2), and people
need one holier to offer sacrifice, one more knowledgeable to teach, and one wiser to govern (Dt
4:6-8). The term order in Roman antiquity generally designated a civil body, especially a
governing body. Ordinatio (Latin) meant to be incorporated into the order. Therefore, when one
was ordained, he was brought into the order.23 That source can be delegated or given to another
party. Jesus gives the leaders of the Church the authority to rule over the Church, or us. They
can consecrate the bread and wine, transforming them into the body and blood of our Lord.
They can baptize us, marry us, anoint our sick and forgive our sins. But they can also teach us
right from wrong and help us distinguish good from evil. When Mariam (Moses’ sister)
questions the authority of Moses, God struck her with leprosy (Nm 12:1-16). Korah’s rebellion
was more serious, and he and his followers were swallowed by a fiery earthquake (Nm 16:1-35).
Christ acknowledges the delegation and handing down of authority when he tells his followers to
listen to the scribes and Pharisees who have taken their seat on the chair of Moses (Mt 23:2-3).
Christ gave the keys to the kingdom of heaven to Peter, allowing him to loosen and to bind (Mt
16:13-20). Christ similarly allowed his apostles to bind and loosen on earth (Mt 18:18). When
we hear the apostles, and their successors, the bishops, we hear Christ (Lk 10:16, Mt 10:14-15,
40-41, Jn 13:20). While God has always allowed us the freedom to choose, when we choose to
follow his chosen leaders, we can ensure that we are following his straight and narrow path. By
humbling ourselves and following this leadership, we lessen ourselves and elevate Christ in the
true order (Jn 3:30).

Marriage is the oldest of the sacraments, often referred to as the primordial (Latinpromordialis-
first of all) sacrament. Therefore, it does not seem unusual that Christ chose the
Wedding Feast at Cana to perform his first public miracle (Jn 2:11). The roots of Marriage go
back to Adam and Eve, where the man leaves his father and mother and clings to his wife, and
the two of them become one body (Gn 2:24). Adam and Eve had no earthly father and mother,
but their union was the first. Following this foreshadowing of the sacrament in Genesis (Greekgenesis- origin), the Church teaches that Marriage has a twofold purpose: unity and procreation.24 This union is supposed to bring us closer to God and procreation unites us to God in his creative purpose. Both purposes reflect our relationship with God as being both united with Him and asco-creator with Him. The goodness of this twofold mission was present from the start. While God recognized the goodness of all creation (Gn 1:4, 10, 12, 18, 21, 25, Wis 11:24-25), its
completion with the creation of humankind is distinguished as very good (Gn 1:31). Formed in
God’s image and likeness (Gn 1:26-27, 5:1, 9:6, 1 Cor 11:7, 2 Cor 3:18, Col 3:10, Jas 3:9),
humanity is called to come together in loving unity in Marriage and to be fruitful and multiply
(Gn 1:28, 9:1, 35:11, Jer 3:16, 29:4-6), just as Eve cooperated with God when she bore her first
child (Gn 4:1) and as Mary said yes to Gabriel that she would bear Jesus (Lk 1:38). We can
contrast these cooperative examples with the sinful actions of Onan, who intentionally avoids
producing offspring (Gn 38:8-10). The indivisible bond between husband and wife produces
holy sons and daughters, adoptive brothers and sisters of Jesus (Gal 4:4-5, Eph 1:5). The agape
love between spouses is no less than between friends as discussed in the Sacrament of the Holy
Eucharist, both spouses should will the good of the other. However, Marriage deals also with
eros, or erotic, love between spouses which is unique in that its purpose is to co-create new,
precious human life. The goodness of the marital embrace is the fruitfulness of the children that
result from it.

Summarizing these seven good things shows us what God treats as the important actions
in our earthly existence: life, growth, nurturing one another, forgiveness, healing/suffering,
authority and procreative union. When we elevate these concepts to a divine nature, we can truly
respect God and the sacraments. Since these holy things are set apart for God, they deserve
respect just as God’s name deserves respect. When these things are treated as ordinary rather
than extraordinary, natural rather than supernatural, or common rather than holy, we do not give
God the respect that He deserves. This may well be a cause of all many of the problems in our
culture. We should set apart as special these holy things: life, growth, love, forgiveness,
healing/suffering, authority and sɛҳuąƖity. If we discount any one of them, we diminish our
respect for God.

John Carberry is the author of Parables: Catholic Apologetics Through Sacred Scripture (2003)
and Sacraments: Signs, Symbols and Significance (2023).

1 Francis, Laudato Si (Praised Be to You), 71.
2 Aquinas, Thomas, Summa Theologica, II, I, Q102, A5, Reply Obj 5.
3 CCC, 2447.
4 CCC, 1831.
5 CCC, 314.
6 Aquinas, Thomas, Summa Theologica, I, Q63, A3.
7 Hugh of Saint Victor, On the Sacraments of the Christian Faith (De Sacramentis), translated by Roy J. Deferrari
(Cambridge, MA: The Mediaeval Academy of America, 1951), 156-158. Compare Aquinas, Thomas, Summa
Theologica, III, Q61, A1.
8 Trent Council, The Catechism of the Council of Trent [Part II, The Sacraments, The Number of Sacraments],
translated by John A McHugh, O.P. and Charles J. Callan, O.P. (London: The Catholic Primer, 1923), p. 105.
9 CCC, 1214.
10 CCC, 2270-2275.
11 CCC, 2276-2279.
12 CCC, 2267.
13 Aquinas, Thomas, Summa Theologica, II, I, Q106, A3.
14 Paul VI, Evangelii Nuntiandi (Proclaiming the Gospel), 54.
15 CCC, 14, 1305 & 1816.
16 CCC, 1, 2610, 2613 & 2761.
17 John Paul II, Dominum Et Vivificantem (Lord and Giver or Life), 46.
18 John Paul II, Evangelium Vitae (Gospel of Life), 31.
19 Aquinas, Thomas, Summa Theologica, I, Q113, A6 & II, II, A19, A1. CCC, 1502.
20 CCC, 961.
21 John Paul II, Salvifici Doloris (Salvific Suffering), 23. Aquinas, Thomas, Summa Theologica, I, Q114, A2. CCC,
2847.
22 John Paul II, Salvifici Doloris (Salvific Suffering), 29.
23 CCC, 1536-1537, 1541-1543, 1554, 1572-1574 & 1593.
24 Paul VI, Humanae Vitae (On Human Life) [Encyclical Letter on the Regulation of Birth] (Vatican City: Libreria
Editrice Vaticana, 1968), 12.