Barack Obama penned a prayer on hotel stationery and slipped it into a crevice in the Western Wall yesterday. An audacious seminary student kept his eye on the paper, fished it out, and delivered it to the Maariv newspaper, which printed the senator’s prayer.

The newspaper’s decision to publish Obama’s prayer was “an outrage,” said Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz, supervisor of the Western Wall. “It damages the personal, deep part of every one of us that we keep to ourselves,” he said.

This sentence bugs me, both for its mix of singular and plural and its nauseating use of “personal.” Of course it’s personal if it’s something deep we keep to ourselves. Personal seldom lends meaning; it pertains to a person — great, we got that. Any thing else?

The good rabbi should have said: “It damages that raw, private part of each of us.”

I know you’re wondering what Obama asked for. Here’s the prayer, according to the Maariv:

Lord, protect my family and me. Forgive me my sins and help me guard against pride and despair. Give me the wisdom to do what is right and just. And make me an instrument of your will.

A lovely prayer and a lovely use of “me” as an object, not a subject. Amen!