The time has come for us to receive our Covid-19 Vaccine! (Well, when our number is called) And with every moment, there is an opportunity for blessing. Below are a number of blessings to choose from. Find one that calls to you or even adapt and create your own. Blessings are the words we express for many moments in our lives.
May each of us be blessed in this moment of healing and wholeness.
Rabbi Heidi
Blessings for Receiving the Covid-19 Vaccine
Collected by Rabbi Lior Nevo
On Receiving a Vaccine:
Modah Ani/Modeh Ani
I thank You
For the wisdom of the scientists
For the courage of the trial volunteers
For the strength and compassion of the health care professionals
For the patience of the delivery workers
All
Who have brought us to this moment.
For our bodies,
Our finely balanced networks
Capable of blessing You
May this vaccine offer protection.
May it offer strength.
May it offer hope
Baruch atah Adonai,
Shehechianu v’ki’manu v’higianu lazman hazeh.
Blessed are You,
who has kept us alive and sustained us and enabled us
to reach this very moment.
-Rabbi Margaret Frisch Klein
Blessing for the Vaccine
Blessed are you, Vaccine,
Holy tool of science, medicine, and health,
Secretly, invisibly transforming pathogen to antigen,
Antigen to immunity.
With each dose, be as anointing oil;
Bless us each with strength and power to fight.
No mere superstition are you, but the work of will,
Curative and creative,
Birthed by knowledge and observation and trial and error,
The culminated work of many minds, many hands, many hearts.
Child of science and magic,
Bless us in turn.
Grant us hardiness, grant us protection,
Grant us the will to persist against imperceptible onslaught.
Do your secret work in our bodies and in our blood,
As you did for our ancestors before us.
With each moment may you grow into your purpose
Of protecting those most susceptible, most vulnerable.
Help us to recognize that you are no malefic potion,
No plot or plan or scheme;
But that you are the embodiment and creation of Love for one another,
That you represent the promise of many hands making light work.
When each of us who can, takes on this tiny risk,
The risk for many more divides, and divides,
Until one day, it’s gone.
May the labor of those who created you be not in vain,
May your promise grow to fulfillment,
May each of us persist, resist, grow strong with your help.
May our losses be eased.
May we be inoculated from strife and trouble.
Vaccine, work of many, child of many:
Blessed be you among balms.
-Rev. Molly Brewer
May the one who hears prayers and requests, hear my prayer. I am about to be given a vaccine to protect me against the novel Coronavirus which has claimed so many lives this year. I am concerned. I know this vaccine might have side effects, and I pray for the strength and grace to handle any that I experience, and to accept that all medications and vaccines have potential side effects. Give me the wisdom to trust my instincts and my body, that I will know when to be concerned. Help my mind to be calm and to trust in this medication and its healing capabilities.
Divine Healer, I am grateful for those whom you have endowed with the knowledge and ability to create vaccines and medications that can protect us against or slow the progress of devastating diseases. I am grateful for my doctors and practitioners who care for me body and spirit. May this medication/vaccine bring me healing, and may I be granted peace of mind in the knowledge that I am sheltered beneath the wings of Shekhina.
Baruch ata Ado-nai, rofeh haKol, shomei-ah t’filati.
–Rabbi Susan Elkodsi
With gratitude and thanksgiving to the Healer of repairable hearts and Restorer of brokenness, appreciation and thanks for inspiring the medical teams and scientists, granting them the wisdom, knowledge, and expertise to prepare this vaccine for all of us. May it be Your will that with my vaccination I will be granted the ability to heal and keep safe humankind and be granted the privilege to fulfill the mitzvah of one who saves a life.
Blessed are You, Healer of all who are sick.
–Rabbi Karen Reiss Medwed
A prayer of thanksgiving for the COVID-19 vaccines
Merciful God, hear our prayers for a world that continues to grapple with a relentless virus, and our gratitude for the light beginning to emerge at the end of a long and deadly tunnel.
As vaccines are at last becoming available for COVID-19 and as people begin to be inoculated around the globe, we give thanks for all whose tireless labors have brought us to this day: technicians, scientists, medical personnel, biotech companies and government agencies that have worked together to find a cure that will restore our communities to wholeness and health.
We pray that the reach of these vaccines will encompass the world, especially those places where medical resources have far too often been inadequate to the need — places where histories of colonialism have left abiding scars and where under-resourced medical systems are overwhelmed by the essential work of caring for those who have been infected.
We continue to pray for healthcare workers around the globe who are running ragged after months of high-risk essential work on the frontlines of this pandemic. Grant them strength, endurance, wisdom and courage for the living of these days. We pray for all who are desperately ill, for those who grieve the loss of loved ones and for those whose physical, mental and economic wellbeing have been most severely impacted by the havoc wrought by the pandemic. Grant wisdom to all entrusted with civic leadership as they discern and negotiate just ways in which to aid those most afflicted. Move our hearts to put partisanship aside for the common good, so that safeguards against the coronavirus will not be ignored and that our communities may be restored and revitalized.
Let us live in the Spirit of Christ for one another and for our world.
God, in your mercy, hear our prayers. Amen.
–Rev. Roger Gench
A Prayer for Receiving the Covid Vaccine
I have been praying for this day and now it is here!
With great excitement, a touch of trepidation
And with deep gratitude I give thanks
To all the scientists who toiled day and night
So that I might receive this tiny vaccination
That will protect me and all souls around this world.
With the pandemic still raging I am blessed to do my part to defeat it.
Let this be the beginning of a new day,
A new time of hope, of joy, of freedom
And most of all, of health. I thank You, God, for blessing me with life
For sustaining my life And for enabling me to reach this awe-filled moment.
Amen
–Rabbi Naomi Levy
Prayer for Receiving the Covid Vaccine
Holy One of Blessing,
I say the shehekyanu prayer
for all the big and little “firsts”
the first day of school
the first meal in a new home
the first time seeing a friend after months have passed
the first night of a holiday
Every “first time” is a time to celebrate
the miracle of life
But as I receive the COVID-19 vaccine,
it feels like the first time I’ve ever said these familiar words
A shehekyanu of shehekyanus
a first that leads to other firsts
the first warm hug from a good friend
the first coffee shop conversation
the first in-person prayer service
the first standing ovation after
the first live performance
the first time my hands touch the hands of another
I receive this first, this vaccine, in memory
of those who died from this disease,
the ones who no longer have firsts to celebrate
and in honor of those who worked while I quarantined
essential workers, medical professionals,
those who risked their lives
to protect mine.
With gratitude to them, and to You,
for my survival in this time of death,
I promise to protect others,
and to bless the miracle
of every breath.
God, please help me remember
to never take another first for granted.
Blessed are You, Source of Life, Breath of the Universe,
who has kept us alive, sustained us,
and brought us to this season.
–Heather Paul, Scatteredleaves.net
We thank you, our God, and God of our ancestors, God of all flesh, the Creator of cures, that You have endowed humankind with knowledge and imbued humanity with the understanding to find and to invent an inoculation to this pandemic. May it be Your will that this vaccine will prevent the spread of the pandemic and save the lives of millions throughout the world.
–From Israel
May it be Your will, Heavenly Healer, that this endeavor be for healing and may You grant healing to me, to my loved ones, to my nation, and to all who are in need. Fill me with a sense of gratitude for all who create, distribute, and deliver this vaccine, and for all those who work for the health of individuals and our communities. Empower me to care in good health ever more deeply for others. Blessed are You, Holy One, Healer of all flesh, sustaining our bodies in wondrous ways.
–Rabbi Aaron Starr, based on Babylonian Talmud, Brachot 60a and the Morning Blessings
A Reflection for Receiving the Coronavirus Vaccine
As we move from darkness to light
May we take this vaccine as a sign of what is to come
A world reopened and renewed
Embracing family and friends
Gathering together in joy
May we also be mindful of what has been
The lives lost
The sorrow felt
And may the past and present intertwine
Giving us hope for the future.
–Rabbi Rebecca Kamil
Intention When Receiving COVID-19 Vaccine
With gratitude for
the wisdom of the scientists
the courage of the clinical trial volunteers
the dedication of the thousands of leaders and workers
who made it possible for me to receive it
May this vaccine protect me from this virus
bring peace of mind to those who hold me dear
give me strength to continue to care for those who
depend on my professional skills and
compassionate presence.
–Rabbi Deborah Miller
