- 75 - administer the last rites to a person who has lost consciousness, in the belief that even though he is in that condition, the rites will effect forgiveness. Common sense should tell you that the anointing of an unconscious person cannot affect the state of his soul. Among the early Christians also it was not the anointing that brought about the forgiveness of sin; rather, the preceding forgiveness removed the obstacle and thus paved the way to healing, allowing the oil to exert its healing properties upon the patient. Inasmuch as in the rites practiced today all of the prerequisites that existed in the early Christian congregations are generally lacking, the so-called ‘last rites’ are a purely external ceremony, of no inward effect whatever.
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