FAITH HEALING REPORT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18641, 23 February 1924, Page 11

FAITH HEALING REPORT

LAMBETH COMMITTEE. SANCTION OF THE CHURCH METHODS RECOMMENDED. The Lambeth Conference of 1920 requested the Archbishop of Canterbury to appoint a committee to consider and report "upon the use with prayer of the iaying-on of hands, of Unction of the Sick, and other spiritual 'means of healing." In its report, which has just been published, the committee,, under the chairmanship of the Bishop of Oxford, recommends that as a general principle the Chprch must sanction methods of religious treatment of bodily disease, but in so doing must give full weight to the scientific discoveries of those who are investigating the inter-relation of spirit, mind, and body. The Church must "insist on hygiene and plain living as part of the ordinance of God." With regard to.the form of ministry to be uf.ed, the committee suggests that ""for purposes of healing, prayer and sacrament should be used in conjunction," and that before any sacramental rites are employed, "earnest and united prayer should be offered on behalf of the sick person in church as well as by the patient himself and his/ friends at home." Preliminary Treatment. While religious methods are applicable to all cases of sickness, they would seem to be most appropriate where moral or intellectual difficulties and perplexities have contributed to the disorder. These deep-lying joots of evil should be dealt with before any specifically bodily healing is attempted. This preliminary treatment requires somei real knowledge not only of moral theology but also of psychology; so- that is is desirable that clergymen who give spiritual direction should "be adequately trained and so enabled to give clear and practical guidance. After an opportunity has been given to the patient to make a "special confession of his sins" and receive absolution, "then might follow treatment more immediately directed to the complete reof the patient."' This may take the form of unction (i.e., anointing with oil by a priest), or the laying-on of hands , "(either by a priest or a lay per safe, or by both). These rites have Scriptural authority and are sacramental in the sense that a blessing is sought and received through the performance of outward and visible actions. Dangers of Psycho-Analysis.

Licensing of individual healers or the official recognition of healing societies by ecclesiastical authority are considered "unnecessary and at present impracticable." Professor Sir Clifford. Allbutt and Sir Robert Armstrong-Jones desired "not to associate themselves with the recommendation of the use of unction." In their preliminary observations the committee stigmatises as "i great evil ' psycho-analysis "undertaken by persons without considerable medical experience and not working in close connection "with a well-qualified physician. . . . In unskilled hands forces may be liberated, in the patient's mind that the _ amateur healer is incapable of controlling, the patient is thereby made worse." Summing up, the committee declares that "in spiritual healing the healing of the spirit. is primary, the healing of the body secondary."