The medieval pattern holds today unchanged: physicians examine the sick and care for their illnesses, and the infirmarian keeps company with the sick in prayer and daily life. When a monk was gravely ill, the monastery sent for the physician from the town; the infirmarian did not take the physician’s place, and the physician did not take his. We keep the same arrangement in a modern society, under modern law.

Physicians do the work that belongs to them: examination, diagnosis, decisions about medicines and procedures, and every judgment about the body. The infirmarian does the work that belongs to the infirmary: prayer for the sick, company at the bedside, advice on the rule of life, the herb garden, consolation through the arts, and the care of the dying. Each side is complete in itself, and neither is a lesser form of the other.

Japanese law draws the same line. In summary, and not in the words of the statutes, it provides as follows:

Everything we do is arranged to stay outside what these provisions reserve to physicians or forbid.

Where to Turn, and When

• For any trouble of the body—pain, fever, a new or changing symptom, or a question about medicines—turn to a physician first. In an emergency, call the emergency services.
• For prayer, for someone to sit with you or with a person you love, for help in ordering daily life during illness, and for care at the end of life, turn to us.
• If you are under a physician’s care, keep to your physician’s instructions in everything. Nothing we offer replaces them, and we will never ask you to set them aside.
• When you are unsure, ask a physician first. We would rather you came to us after seeing a physician than instead of seeing one.

At IHS Bethlehem Church, we never intervene in a physician’s findings or instructions. While physicians care for the sick, and after their work is done, we remain on the side of prayer and daily life.