Sacraments

      Baptism
      Becoming a Catholic
      Celebration of Mass
      First Communion
      Reconciliation
      Confirmation
      Marriage
      Holy Orders
      Anointing of the Sick
      Funeral Rites

     

Catechism on Sacraments

Nature of Sacraments

Sacraments

...Span all stages of natural life and all important moments of the Christian life.

1. Baptism
2. Confirmation
3. The Eucharist
4. Reconciliation
5. Anointing of the Sick
6. Matrimony
7. Holy Orders

The Church further groups them in this way:
The Sacraments of Initiation (Baptism, Confirmation and Eucharist)
The Sacraments of Healing (Reconciliation & Anointing of the Sick)
Sacraments at the Service of Communion (Matrimony and Holy Orders)

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The Sacraments

The whole liturgical life of the church revolves around the Eucharistic sacrifice and the sacraments  -CCC, no. 1113

We recognize that the Sacraments have a visible and invisible reality, a reality open to all the human senses but grasped in its God-given depths with the eyes of faith. When parents hug their children, for example, the visible reality we see is the hug. The invisible reality the hug conveys is love. We cannot "see" the love the hug expresses, though sometimes we can see its nurturing effect in the child.

The visible reality we see in the Sacraments is their outward expression or signs  (bread, wine, oil, water...)and the ways in which they are administered and received. The invisible reality we cannot "see" is God's grace, His gracious initiative in redeeming us through the death and Resurrection of His Son. 

His initiative is called grace because it is the free and loving gift by which He offers people a share in His life and shows us His favor and will for our salvation. Our response to the grace of God's initiative is itself a grace or gift from God by which we can imitate Christ in our daily lives.

The saving words and deeds of Jesus Christ are the foundation of what He would communicate in the
Sacraments through the ministers of the Church. Guided by the Holy Spirit, the Church recognizes the existence of Seven Sacraments instituted by the Lord. They are the Sacraments of Initiation (Baptism, Confirmation,the Eucharist), the Sacraments of Healing (Penance and the Anointing of the Sick), and the Sacraments at the 
Service of Communion (Marriage and Holy Orders). Through the Sacraments, God shares His holiness with us so that we, in turn, can make the world holier.
http://www.usccb.org/prayer-and-worship/sacraments/

The Latin word sacramentum means "a sign of the sacred."  God's saving presences is experienced through these seven Sacraments.