The church is celebrating the World Day of the Sick next Wednesday, February 11th, 2009. Saturday in Dublin a dramatic theatre representation of stories of suicide marked the day.
Suicide a Community Responds was the theme for a conference of parish representatives and professionals in St. John of God Conference Centre in Stillorgan.
It included experiences of parish communities, priests, parents, youth workers and professionals, and how they are trying to change a culture in which suicide occurs.
Bishop Raymond Field of the Dublin Diocesan World Day of the Sick Committee said their hope was that this discussion would help communities support people involved in the trauma of suicide.
“This is about being proactive in developing a sense of wellbeing, care and support for people in the community, who at times in the past have felt powerless in the face of suicide,” said Bishop Field.
The event included a drama presentation called Life Force, by the Blue Drum Theatre Company.
It presented stories around people who died through suicide and facilitates discussion based on the various stages of someone making the decision to take their own life, as to how people could have intervened and made a difference.
Tomorrow, Sunday 8th February at 3pm Archbishop Diarmuid Martin celebrates the Annual Diocesan Mass of Healing and Anointing of the Sick in the Church of Our Lady Help of Christians, Navan Road, Dublin 7.
The World Day of the Sick was instituted by Pope John Paul II on May 13 in 1992. He had been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease the year before.
The Pope had written a great deal on the topic of suffering and believed that it was very much a salvific and redeeming process through Christ, as he indicated in his apostolic letter Salvifici Doloris.
The day has been celebrated every year on the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, and is considered a special time of prayer and sharing, and of offering up sufferings.
The occasion also provides an opportunity for those involved in health care to recall the roots of their healing mission.
Many dioceses are assisting parishes to mark the day by putting together resources for liturgies.
Kildare and Leighlin is one diocese offering such aids on its website.
It suggests that in the homily of the day, celebrants can note that the sacrament of anointing is the proper sacrament for those Christians whose health is seriously impaired by sickness or old age.
But they should also note the misinterpretation that this sacrament is for the dying and that it should be delayed to as close to death as possible.
"Really it is appropriate once a person has reached old age or if I has a permanent physical, emotional or mental disability. This is a repeatable sacrament, even within the experience of one illness, when a person’s condition may deteriorate.
Also, within some long term medical conditions (for example, alcoholism, mental illness) there can be acute phases when an anointing can be beneficial to the individual," according to the site.
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(Source: CIN)