One day [childrens television's] Mister Rogers was making a trip to California and decided to pay a visit to a teenager with cerebral palsy. "At first, the boy was made very nervous by the thought that Mister Rogers was visiting him," [Tom] Junod writes. "He was so nervous, in fact, that when Mister Rogers did visit, he got mad at himself and began hating himself and hitting himself, and his mother had to take him to another room." Mister Rogers waited patiently and when the boy came back, Mister Rogers said, "I would like you to do something for me. Would you do something for me?" On his computer, the boy answered yes. "I would like you to pray for me. Will you pray for me?"

Junod says that the boy was "thunderstruck" because "nobody had ever asked him for something like that, ever. The boy had always been prayed for. The boy had always been the object of prayer, and now he was being asked to pray for Mister Rogers, and although at first he didn't know if he could do it, he said he would, he said he'd try, and ever since then he keeps Mister Rogers in his prayers and doesn't talk about wanting to die anymore because he figures Mister Rogers is close to God, and if Mister Rogers likes him, that must mean God likes him, too."

Tom Junod asked Mister Rogers how he knew what to say to make the boy feel better. He responded: "Oh, heavens no, Tom! I didn't ask him for his prayers for him; I asked for me. I asked him because I think that anyone who has gone through challenges like that must be very close to God. I asked him because I wanted his intercession."