Should we pray for healing?

friend leans over to you at services and whispers that a congregant is terminally ill. Regardless of your connection — close, remote, conflicted — shock levels the relational field. When the Jewish prayer for healing arrives in the service, thoughts of this person permeate every word, line and hope. The next week you learn that a 35-year-old synagogue member who has struggled with bipolar disorder since her teens is back in the psychiatric ward. You reach out to her in the prayer for healing, encircling her like a balm. A few months later, after a 23-year-tenure at the same firm, you suddenly lose your job. Now it’s your time to pray — for your family, your children, yourself. These scenarios find their rightful place in […]