I was sick, and ye visited Me

Image courtesy of the Fatebenefratelli of Saint John of God.
CHAPTER XXXVI. Of the Sick Brethren

15 Mar. 15 July. 14 Nov.

Before all things and above all things care is to be had of the sick, that they be served in very deed as Christ Himself, for He hath said: “I was sick, and ye visited Me.” And, “What ye have done unto one of these little ones, ye have done unto Me.” And let the sick themselves remember that they are served for the honour of God, and not grieve the brethren who serve them by unnecessary demands. Yet must they be patiently borne with, because from such as these is gained a more abundant reward. Let it be, therefore, the Abbot’s greatest care that they suffer no neglect. And let a cell be set apart by itself for the sick brethren, and one who is God-fearing, diligent and careful, be appointed to serve them. Let the use of baths be allowed to the sick as often as may be expedient; but to those who are well, and especially to the young, let it be granted more seldom. Let the use of flesh meat also be permitted to the sick and to those who are very weakly, for their recovery: but when they are restored to health, let all abstain from meat in the accustomed manner. The Abbot must take all possible care that the sick be not neglected by the Cellarer or servers; because whatever is done amiss by his disciples is laid to his charge.

Before All Things and Above All Things
Saint Benedict places care of the sick before all things and above all things. One finds comparable expressions in the Holy Rule with regard to the love of Christ (Chapter IV:21) and the Work of God (Chapter XLIII). The sick brother is a real presence of Christ in the monastery. Our Constitutions make this clear:

150. The community will show their sick brethren the most tender compassion in both word and deed. Believing that, save in the Most Holy Sacrament of the Altar, Our Lord is nowhere more present in the monastery than in the person of a monk brought low by infirmity, the monks will treat him with the greatest charity, making allowance for his weaknesses and bearing his burdens.

Living Sickness Well
As for the sick themselves, they must not take advantage of the love shown them, by becoming capricious, cranky, and demanding. If they are served with tenderness and reverence, it is for God’s sake. It is easy for a sick brother to begin to see himself as the centre of the universe, to become self-absorbed, and anxious over many things. The brother who falls into these faults has lost sight of the meaning of his monastic oblation. By Baptism, by the seal of the Holy Spirit in Confirmation, and by virtue of every Holy Communion he receives, as well as by virtue of his monastic profession and consecration, the monk is a victim, that is one offered irrevocably to God in sacrifice.

Victimhood
The vocabulary of victim and victimhood has been much abused and is often misunderstood and manipulated. It is, nonetheless, indispensable, because it belongs to the liturgy of the Church (the lex orandi), wherein it is applied, again and again, to all the baptized insofar as they are united to Christ in the mystery of His Sacrifice. A victim, in the traditional liturgical sense of the term, is not one to whom something bad has happened; a victim is a sacrificial offering placed upon the altar, whence it ascends to God. We pray, for instance, in the Secret of the Votive Mass of Jesus Christ, Eternal High Priest:

O Lord, may Jesus Christ, our Mediator,
render these offerings acceptable to Thee,
and may He present us with Himself as victims agreeable to Thee.
Who being God, liveth and reigneth with Thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost,
forever and ever.

Union With the Passion of Christ
A monk living with chronic illness will find a serene joy in the midst suffering once he begins to place himself with Our Lord on the altar of His sacrifice. Then he will be caught up in the immense movement out of self and into the infinity of God to which the priest invites the people in every Holy Mass: Sursum corda! Hearts on high! The monk, who accepts his illness in the light of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, will begin to see his sickroom as a sanctuary, his bed as an altar, and himself as an oblation — a sacrificial victim — in the hands of Christ the Priest. Illness, weakness, and fatigue, be they physical or mental, or both at the same time, can become life-giving when infused with the dispositions of the Heart of Jesus, Priest and Victim in His Passion, and in the Sacrament of His Love, that Passion’s abiding memorial.

We suffer persecution, but are not forsaken; we are cast down, but we perish not: Always bearing about in our body the mortification of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be made manifest in our bodies. For we who live are always delivered unto death for Jesus’ sake; that the life also of Jesus may be made manifest in our mortal flesh. So then death worketh in us, but life in you. (2 Corinthians 4:9-12)

Bound to Jesus Christ Suffering and Dying
Our Constitutions invite the monk struggling with illness, and faced with death, to enter into the victimal dispositions of the Heart of Jesus:

148. As victims destined for sacrifice, monks, though living are always being delivered unto death for Jesus’ sake; that the life also of Jesus may be made manifest in their mortal flesh. The infirmary is, ordinarily, the place in which, though death be at work in us, He who raised up Jesus, will raise us up also with Him. Like the outer court of the temple, wherein the victims of the Old Law were put to death, or the amphitheatre in which the holy martyrs, exposed to the furor of beasts and the rage of tyrants, caused their faith and their love to shine forth, although those who are languishing or close to death be in the hands of brethren who desire only to succour them in their need, it will sometimes happen that Divine Providence allows their sufferings to increase by the very remedies that ought to have relieved them.

Were a monk free to choose his manner of death, zeal would, undoubtedly, move him to shed his blood in sacrifice at the foot of the altar so as to offer some proof of love to Him who there resides. But, as by the sacrifice of his vows, a monk has no longer any right over himself, nor the freedom to do as he chooses, he will submit his heart’s holiest ardours to the law of the will of God, so as to die at the time and in the place pleasing to Him, regarding his sickbed as the place of holocaust whereupon his sufferings bind him to Jesus Christ suffering and dying.