When I mentioned this conversation to my friend, Mary, she said that prayer, in her opinion, does nothing. You may as well be telling them that you'll be going out to grab a burger later on. Unless you've got some sort of telekinetic power, thinking about someone means absolutely nothing. Prayer is an active participation in both the grief AND HOPE of both the person suffering and that person's community. Prayer can also comfort the family and friends who mourn the suffering of their loved ones. Prayer can cure illness, speed recovery and shorten the suffering of those on their final journey. To a person of faith, prayer DOES something. So what does thinking of someone actually do? They also contain a message of help ("I'm thinking of you / praying for you"). Sympathy cards contain a message of unity ("I'm sorry for your loss") that conveys a sharing of grief. In my mind, it's a politically-correct, sterilized way to unload responsibility.
As I stumbled over more and more "in my thoughts," however, I wondered what that even meant. Given the fact that we work for the Archdiocese, "in my prayers" wasn't a surprise. Some of us were writing things like "You and your family are in my prayers." Others wrote "You and your family are in my thoughts." We decided to send a Mass card with messages of love and prayer to him and his family during this difficult time. A coworker's father has been very ill for the last few weeks.
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