Toto

I'm listening to it new. Jeez. Orthodox Jews have a prayer after going to the bathroom?

Other examples - people praying that the car following them in the dark doesn't have a gun, people praying for parking spaces, a woman who prayed for a child who died. A woman who visualized herself sitting on God's lap.

A kid who prayed for nail polish, but she dropped it, so he must not have meant her to have it.

A man who didn't pray because if god intervened in the world, how could there be a Holocaust and all the horrors, and if he believed in that sort of a god he couldn't believe in god at all.

That was part one. Tomorrow, "spiritual mapping."

Is this a serious look at prayer, or an unintentional parody?

Strawberry

I heard parts of that too. I thought it was, at least, tasteful and respectful to those of us who obviously don't pray. But then, I didn't hear the whole thing. I liked the part where the girl said she didn't think God answered prayers, she thought it was more a therapeutic excercise. How I wish there were more xians like that kicking around and less of the fundy persuasion...

emotional

</strong>

Yes. It's called Asher Yatsar, meaning "He Who Made", and it goes like this:

Blessed art thou, Adonai, King of the World, Who made mankind having holes and pores. It is manifest and known before thee that if one of them should be blocked, or one of them should break, then it would be impossible to stand before thee even one hour.

Ronin

You gotta be shittin' me.

The atheist one starts like this ~ 'Here I sit, broken hearted..."

mecca777

<a href="http://home.attbi.com/~judaism/Siddur/transliterations/daily/ber_praise.htm#asher_yatsar" target="_blank">Asher Yatzar</a>

And Ronin: <img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" /> <img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" />

HelenM

I thought you were kidding, dev, until I looked at the link someone else gave. I guess not!

Helen

[ December 25, 2002: Message edited by: HelenM ]</p>

emotional

Nay, I wasn't kidding at all. There's a blessing for almost every action in Orthodox Judaism, and I recited those pieces of yang for over two years.

On drinking water: blessed art thou, Adonai, King of the World, by Whose word everything has come to be.

On eating an apple: blessed art thou (etc), the Creator of the fruit of the tree.

On eating a vegetable salad: blessed... the Creator of the fruit of the earth.

On eating bread, followed by a complete meal: blessed... He Who brings bread forth from the earth.

On waking up: I thank thee, o living and extant King, that thou hast returned my soul into me. Plentiful is your trustfulness.

And there's more, ad nauseam... the Talmud says the number of brakhot (blessings) recited by a Jew daily should be no less than a 100. Among the blessings that a Jewish man recites in the morning are shelo asani goy ("that He has not made me a Gentile") and shelo asani isha ("that He has not made me a woman"). Ain't Judaism a nice, compassionate religion?

Toto

I missed the Christmas day segment (maybe just as well), but Thursday's involved prayers for healing. There was a Reform Jewish group that recited a healing prayer, claiming that you didn't have to believe in god. But this was followed by a very good segment debunking the claim that distance prayer works, with scientists opining that the studies that hinted at that were flawed.

Puck

I listen to NPR alot when I am puttering in the shop and awhile back there were quite a few callers saying that that there wasn't any christian veiwpoints in regard to their topics. I thought at the time that the fundys were trying to infiltrate...

Now I've noticed alot of religous crap being brought up on NPR.

Same with callers complaining about NPR being lefties and not representing conservative viewpoints...

Since NPR gets govt. funding...