DAY 161
CHALLENGE
“The Catholic Church is wrong to say there are seven sacraments. It’s even inconsistent with its own history. Historically, some Catholic authorities have listed as many as thirty sacraments.”
DEFENSE
How many sacraments there are depends on how you use the term.
The Latin term sacramentum comes from sacrare, which means “to make sacred” or “to consecrate.” At one point, sacramentum referred to a sacred oath, but it came to refer to sacred rites in any religion.
St. Augustine wrote: “There can be no religious society, whether the religion be true or false, without some sacrament or visible symbol to serve as a bond of union” (Reply to Faustus 19:11). Thus Catholic authors have historically referred to Jewish rites such as the Passover lamb and various blessings as “sacraments of the Old Law” (ST III:60:2 reply to obj. 2, 6; reply to obj. 3, III:61:3, 4).
In the Christian context, “sacrament” came to refer to many Chris- tian rituals. Thus Hugh of St. Victor (1096–1141) listed thirty sacraments (On the Sacraments of the Christian Faith). Other authors in the Middle Ages gave different numbers (frequently between five and twelve), showing there was no fixed definition at the time. The term was flexible.
Eventually, a standard definition came into use. This definition recognized sacraments as rites instituted by Christ to impart grace. The Catechism states: “The sacraments are efficacious signs of grace, instituted by Christ and entrusted to the Church, by which divine life is dispensed to us” (CCC 1131).
When this definition is applied, the number of sacraments becomes clearer. Some rites—like baptism—were established by Christ to efficaciously convey grace or divine life (Matt. 28:19; 1 Pet. 3:21), and so they count as sacraments. Other rites—like foot washing—may have been established by Christ (John 13:1–17), but they don’t convey grace and so are not sacraments. Still others were instituted after the time of Christ and so are not sacraments. Many in the last category have come to be called “sacramentals” (CCC 1667–79).
The Church thus came to recognize that there are seven sacraments according to this definition: baptism, confirmation, the Eucharist, penance, anointing of the sick, holy orders, and matrimony (CCC 1113).