Gratias pro Venerata Rocio Ávila-Ramírez de Weddington UMC

Amici, Americani, Compatriotae,

Skin Burns Resulting from Boiling Water

Yesterday early afternoon my wife's niece (who lives with us) was preparing tea in the Filipino tradition. Having boiled water in a kettle and having placed large tea bags in a glass picture, she commenced to pour the 212 F liquid into the 70 F container. Of course this was a challenge to the laws of physics. When hot liquid is poured into a cold and brittle container, the inside wall of the container tries to expand but the outside wall has contracted. This is due to the 142 F temperature differential. Glass, being made of silicon dioxide molecules in a crystal lattice structure, has little to no ductility. So under the expansive stresses on the inside wall and compressive stresses on the outside wall, the crystals (instead of sliding) shear away from each other suddenly and without warning. This happened and the glass catastrophically cracked, spilling the hot liquid on the thighs of my wife's niece. Third degree burns resulted and a trip to the emergency room of the local hospital ensued. The staff - receptionists, physicians, and nurses - all operated with alacrity, efficiency and effectiveness, administering large quantities of opiates for pain relief and cleaning the wounds. By early evening she was back home and in bed, though both legs were wrapped in gauze bandages.

Now when this happened, being a devout Catholic, I immediately thought of the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick as delineated in James 5:13-16:

13 Is any one among you suffering? Let him pray. Is any cheerful? Let him sing praise. 14 Is any among you sick? Let him call for the elders [ πρεσβυτέρους in Greek ] of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; 15 and the prayer of faith will save the sick man, and the Lord will raise him up; and if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.16 Therefore confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man has great power in its effects.

However, because my wife's niece is Protestant - Methodist to be specific - and because Protestant sacramental practice is quite different (if existent at all), I made effort to locate a clergy person within the ecclesial community of which she is a member to come and pray for her. I sent a message via Facebook Messenger to her community, the Weddington United Methodist Church. A person monitoring FB messenger contacted the community's lead pastor, Rev. Dr. Terry Moore, who in turn assigned the task for visitation and prayer to Rev. Rocio Ávila-Ramírez. I was happily and gratefully surprised with the responsiveness of the Weddington UMC because staff at that community doesn't know me from Adam, yet they responded as if they had known me all along. Such is true Christian charity (Latin - caritas).

Rev. Rocio
Avila-Ramerez

Now the reader should bear in mind that last night temperature had dipped to the mid 20 F (somewhere around - 6 C), and it was a Saturday evening after a bad winter storm for the area of Charlotte, NC and Lancaster, SC. Yet in spite of this cold and inclement condition, and in spite of her duties to her husband and her children, Rev. Rocio braved the elements and drove to the hospital to pray from my wife's niece. She did not find my wife's niece there because the physician in charge had just released her into the care of my wife and myself, and we had brought her home. So she telephoned me on my cell (Weddington UMC having had the foresight to provide my cell phone number). I went to the hospital where her car was sitting, picked her up and drove her to our home so that she could pray over my wife's niece. Using my 1979 Anglican Book of Common Prayer Rev Rocio prayed and provided counsel and consolation, after which I returned her to her vehicle at the hospital.

Again I was impressed that Rev Rocio put her personal needs on a Saturday evening aside to come to the home of a perfect stranger - and a Catholic at that! - to minister to a person whom she hardly knew. While of course we who are Catholic have theological differences with Methodists, it is this Christian charity (caritas) which we all would do well to emulate in our lives. I have to ask myself: would I be willing to go out in the winter cold in the dead of night with a stranger to help an injured person whom I hardly knew? Rev Rocio did precisely that and imitated the best in the Story of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10:25-37.

The following is addressed to my Catholic readers. Yes, we know that the Catechism of the Catholic Church spells out what the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick entails and who can administer it:

1516 Only priests [ bishops (ἐπισκόποις) and presbyters (πρεσβυτέρους) ] are ministers of the Anointing of the Sick.

1517 Like all the sacraments the Anointing of the Sick is a liturgical and communal celebration, whether it takes place in the family home, a hospital or church, for a single sick person or a whole group of sick persons. It is very fitting to celebrate it within the Eucharist, the memorial of the Lord's Passover. If circumstances suggest it, the celebration of the sacrament can be preceded by the sacrament of Penance and followed by the sacrament of the Eucharist. As the sacrament of Christ's Passover the Eucharist should always be the last sacrament of the earthly journey, the "viaticum" for "passing over" to eternal life.

1518 Word and sacrament form an indivisible whole. the Liturgy of the Word, preceded by an act of repentance, opens the celebration. the words of Christ, the witness of the apostles, awaken the faith of the sick person and of the community to ask the Lord for the strength of his Spirit.

1519 The celebration of the sacrament includes the following principal elements: the "priests of the Church" - in silence - lay hands on the sick; they pray over them in the faith of the Church - this is the epiclesis proper to this sacrament; they then anoint them with oil blessed, if possible, by the bishop. These liturgical actions indicate what grace this sacrament confers upon the sick.

We also know that in Ordinatio Sacerdotalis Pope St John Paul II explained why only men and not women can be ordained to the priesthood (and thus, a woman cannot administer the Sacraments, including the Anointing of the Sick):

[The Church] holds that it is not admissible to ordain women to the priesthood, for very fundamental reasons. These reasons include: the example recorded in the Sacred Scriptures of Christ choosing his Apostles only from among men; the constant practice of the Church, which has imitated Christ in choosing only men; and her living teaching authority which has consistently held that the exclusion of women from the priesthood is in accordance with God's plan for his Church....

...the Church "does not consider herself authorized to admit women to priestly ordination."

However, all that said does NOTHING to diminish the great service which Rev. Rocio rendered last night for a member of her ecclesial community. And when someone is in utter and unremitting pain from third degree burns, one doesn't argue theology but does what is best to render the most comfort. My wife's niece is Protestant, and out of respect for her I sought out what would give her the most comfort. Additionally, while Catholics do not accept a female priesthood, Rev. Rocio deserves every bit of my respect in having tried to do what in her lights is the Lord's work. My job is to facilitate that demonstration of caritas and not be a theological stick in the mud. Therefore I say to Rev. Rocio:

Tibi multas gratias ago!