Can/Do/Should People Receive Last Rites Before Being Executed?

[GEddie]

After the drop, it is fair to presume the person had sustained mortally-serious injury, at the very least, so it seems possible a priest would anoint the fellow if it wasn’t certain he was dead. Priests anoint wounded soldiers on the field who are not known to have died, even though they do not give anointing of the sick when the soldier heads into battle but is not wounded yet. That is what the sacrament is for–those who have gotten sick or sustained an injury, not those who might. Those who are anointed prior to a surgery, for instance, are being treated by surgery for a malady they have at the time they are anointed.

Now, what exactly is going to be done by the authorities if the priest or other Christian lays his hands on someone who was supposed to have been executed and the guy comes around, I do not know. It seems to me they ought to conclude that Heaven commuted the prisoner’s sentence, and give him a reprieve. (I do not mean that as a joke. It is possible, after all.)

This would not have happened in Behan’s scenario, as the anointing is done while the body remains hanging. No recovery would be possible.

However, if it did happen (hanging body starts to breathe and move around etc) methinks that would be considered under the heading of “indubitable miracle”!

ICXC NIKA.

 

[Joe_Kelley]

There is an Apostolic Pardon , a plenary indulgence that can/should be given to one in danger of death. I don’t see that this requires a bodily ill. It is usually given in conjunction with the anointing of the sick, but appears that it can be given after the Sacrament of Penance.

The Handbook of Indulgences #28 states: "Priests who minister the sacraments to the Christian faithful who are in a life-and-death situation should not neglect to impart to them the apostolic blessing, with its attached indulgence. But if a priest cannot be present, holy mother Church lovingly grants such persons who are rightly disposed a plenary indulgence to be obtained in articulo mortis, at the approach of death, provided they regularly prayed in some way during their lifetime. The use of a crucifix or a cross is recommended in obtaining this plenary indulgence. In such a situation the three usual conditions required in order to gain a plenary indulgence are substituted for by the condition ‘provided they regularly prayed in some way.’

Articulo mortis = at the point of death.