Dear Judy,
I hope what I’m emailing doesn’t make me sound callous. My sister-in-law who is very devout and religious is in a very bad place: she has very advanced ovarian cancer, and is undergoing chemo, but with little hope of longterm survival.
Every time I visit her with my wife, she tells us, “Please pray for me!” That’s not a problem for my wife. But for me it is. I don’t believe in personal intercessions from a god. Sometimes I don’t think I believe in a god at all, and also I hate being a hypocrite.
On the other hand my sister-in-law is a very nice lady. She is kind and thoughtful and good and I feel terrible for her. But what do I do? Tell her, nothing personal but I can’t pray because it’s against my principles? Or promise her in a totally sleazy fashion that I will in fact pray for her, but then renege in private?
What would you advise?
Philip
Dear Philip,
I vote for Option B: promise her you will pray for her and then, if you must, renege in private.
Why? Because in my book the terminally ill have the upper hand in 98 percent of their requests. Maybe 99 percent.
Your object is to be kind to a person who has always been, as you put it, kind herself. If making an empty promise is the way to accomplish this, then make that promise. And by the way — I see no problem with going all the way, either ; namely actually trying to pray on her behalf.
OK — it may be a once-in-a-lifetime thing. It may go against your gut. It may accomplish, as you suspect, absolutely nothing.
But what’s the downside?
Thank you for writing
Judy
