"It's our job as civilians to tend to the returning warriors by bringing them into the center of the community," says this psychotherapist and author of "War and the Soul."

"Patients require that one-on-one encounter, the Samaritan function of being a physician," says writer and Stanford Medical School professor Abraham Verghese. "When the physician examines the patient, this is an incredibly important ritual."

"Patients require that one-on-one encounter, the Samaritan function of being a physician," says writer and Stanford Medical School professor Abraham Verghese. "I'm convinced that when the physician examines the patient, this is an incredibly important ritual."

It is the belief of many Chinese that there is an ongoing spiritual connection between them and their forebears. They venerate them, pray to them, and take gifts to their graves.

Every summer, first-year medical students from throughout Maryland gather with family members of people who donated their bodies to science.

A synagogue with a class in which boys and girls preparing for their coming of age ceremonies, bar mitzvahs and bat mitzvahs, make their own tallit.

Observant Jews prepare for Passover by getting rid of everything in the house that is chametz, or leavened. We visited the Orthodox Jewish family of Ari and Shoshana Lerner to see how they were preparing.

"Repentance, prayer, and charity are the hallmark[s] of this season," says Rabbi Gary Bretton-Granatoor, "We search our souls and then we pour out our souls to God, saying, 'God help us, give us the strength to be the kind of people that we want to be.'"

"Rather than to try to change God, prayer should change us, should make us better human beings. That is the ultimate purpose of prayer," says Cantor Abraham Lubin of Congregation Beth El in Bethesda, Maryland. We spoke with him as he prepared for the high holidays.