Say a little prayer for me.

Inviting others to pray with us for our "special intentions" is a way of enacting the blessed truth that if one of us suffers, we all suffer.

I WAS SAYING GOODBYE TO A FRIEND I HADN'T SEEN IN A while. As we were parting she looked back and said, "Oh, and can you remember to pray for my special intention?"

That question brought back memories. I knew this friend from my grammar-school days, and hers was not an intrequent question among parishioners at St. Symphorosa and Her Seven Sons Parish when I was growing up. At school, in the A&P, or on the church steps, people might easily ask one another to pray for a special intention.

Surely those were days of more reticence, when a person's private troubles tended to remain undisclosed. This was before Jerry Springer enticed a steady stream of people to come on national TV because "I have a dirty little secret I need to get off my chest."

So when a person was worried about a parent who was morose, or had a sister going into the hospital for tests, or had an uncle who'd run off with his secretary and everyone was praying he'd come back to his senses as well as to his family, you'd pray about it. And because we believed in the power of prayer and the solace of solidarity, we implored our friends to join their prayers with ours and remember our special intention. The intention could remain unspoken; people's privacy was respected, and yet our worries could be shared.

Special intentions speak volumes about the Catholic sense of solidarity. We believe we are all one body, the Body of Christ. Inviting others to pray with and for us is a way of enacting the blessed truth that if one of us suffers, we all suffer.

The church gives us many ways to formally join our prayers with those of others. Each weekend, we lift up special intentions through the Prayers of the Faithful. Many parish bulletins include a section listing people of the parish for whom to pray. Hundreds of thousands of devotees of the Little Flower, Our Lady of the Snows, St. Jude Thaddeus, and other saints send their heartfelt intentions off to be placed before shrines around the country. Some parishes have an open book near the entrance to their church where worshipers can jot down a few words about the concerns they are bearing as they come to the divine feast.

Inviting others to pray for one's special intentions convenes the church. "Wherever two or more are gathered in my name, I am there in their midst."

This became evident to me when my wife and I were meeting regularly with a faith-sharing group years ago. Always the most poignant time each week was when we'd briefly share a spontaneous "prayer of the faithful." From an awkward collection of acquaintances, each of us nervous, protective, and shy, we were turned, through the grace of God, into a group of believers who let down our guard, opened our hearts, and experienced the flow of God's love in and through each member of the group.

Cynics may scoff at the practice of asking others to pray for an undisclosed special intention. But I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss folk customs that tend to carry their own wisdom. What might the value of this practice be?

People who avail themselves of such help exercise their belief in the power of prayer. They know that it is good to expose our concerns, our worries, our yearnings, and our hopes to the light of God's love, and to ask for the support and aid of our fellow believers as we do so. God is eager to give us all good things. But God can only work when we let go. Declaring our special intention is a way of letting go, or at least exposing our worry and fear to the merciful gaze of a loving God.

My friend Ed tells me his family has long had a statue of Saint Jude on the window sill in their kitchen. Whenever anyone in the family had a special intention they wanted the rest of the family to pray for, they would write it (however cryptically) on a small sheet of note paper and slide it beneath the statue. The rest of the family would keep that special intention in mind all week. I'm sure Saint Jude did, too.

Today Ed's family is far-flung with grown-up children in remote states and on distant continents. But hearing him talk about his family's prayer practice, I'd bet they still are connected by bonds of love and prayer and very special intentions on behalf of one another.

By TOM McGRATH, executive editor of U.S. CATHOLIC magazine and editor of its family life beat.