Ribbons of Prayer

Walking, among other things, saved my life. Somewhere around 2000, I was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus. This is the kind of diabetes where the body stops producing insulin altogether and requires daily injections of insulin to process sugars in the blood. I was really sick when I was diagnosed, and daily walks helped me to heal. Daily walks also improve my blood sugar control, so that I am less likely to develop some of the nastier health problems associated with diabetes.

It is good to be getting back into the practice of walking.

As I was walking back home from the Iowa City Public Library, I passed Trinity Episcopal Church and noticed this prayer box.

Inside the box was a notebook for listing prayers and strips of cloth which could be hung on a tree in the church's yard. I took the opportunity to invite prayers for a friend of mine who has cancer-ugly, messy, nasty, painful cancer. I still don't know what these kinds of prayers are all about. I don't know whether they work-whether people at a distance know they are being prayed for; whether they receive healing or help-but I do know that participating in this kind of religious practice is good. It is a practice in the humility of what if, and it can't hurt. It also connects me to countless other human beings, whether those humans are the people whose ribbons hang with mine, or the humans who built that church all the way back to the first Episcopal Church, and so on.

As I stood there and wrote down my prayer, college students, harried adults with trains of children, and Iowa City-fit older adults streamed by. It felt strange to participate in such a public act of religious faith and ritual. At the same time, I wondered what they were doing, where they were going, that they didn't stop and add their own ribbons to the tree.

I loved that the box also included a sheet with a practical guide for prayer which I could take home. Thank you Trinity Episcopal for this little piece of public religion, education and hospitality.