Honoring the Physicians

On October 18, 2021, we celebrated the feast of St. Luke. Luke was a prolific writer and physician who never met Jesus. So, in his honor, we offer this prayer of healing. This prayer is a wonderful reminder that God is the great physician and prayer is the best medicine. Physicians are extensions of God’s love on earth.

Ecclesiastes 38:1-4,6-10,12-14

Honor physicians for their services,
for the Lord created them;
for their gift of healing comes from the Most High,
and they are rewarded by the king.
The skill of physicians makes them distinguished,
and in the presence of the great, they are admired.
The Lord created medicines out of the earth,
and the sensible will not despise them.

And he gave skill to human beings
that he might be glorified in his marvelous works.
By them the physician heals and takes away pain;
the pharmacist makes a mixture from them.
God’s works will never be finished;
and from him, health spreads over all the earth.
My child, when you are ill, do not delay,
but pray to the Lord, and he will heal you.

Give up your faults and direct your hands rightly,
and cleanse your heart from all sin.
Then give the physician his place, for the Lord created him;
do not let him leave you, for you need him.
There may come a time when recovery lies in the hands of physicians,
for they too pray to the Lord
that he grant them success in diagnosis
and in healing, for the sake of preserving life.