Do Archangels, in particular, have specialties? Is it wise to appeal to Raphael as the healer, Gabriel as the messenger, and so on, or will that limit us?

As we have discussed with you many times, these are appealing notions. The whole idea of the various hierarchies espoused by different religious faiths bringing forward their perspectives of the angelic realm, as well as the various personas that are named archangels and their characteristics, served to make the angelics appear accessible through being somewhat human-like at least. And therefore would be naturally expected to have a career, a profession, a particular skill that matches their primary duties, and a specialty, as a consequence of which they are known and forms the basis of their range of operations. This is a vast oversimplification and is actually, more often than not, working against people who will latch onto a particular being because of things they have heard or read about that particular angel and then may focus, to the exclusion of other options, on where they can subsequently obtain divine assistance. As with engaging with a spirit guide, it often underserves the person to restrict oneself to a single divine agent when there are many and, in fact, groups acting at once, that can be summoned through a request for help, when there are no limitations placed on that request in the form of who is specified to deliver the divine intervention. It is always highest and best to go to Creator when making a request to the Divine because that preserves the greatest possible array of choices and combinations of divine agents who can be dispatched to assist with a dilemma and take care of a problem. If the request restricts the divine realm to a single agent, this will often underserve the person because that particular being may need to take action in ways requiring a team, and this is precluded because the divine realm must always follow the human lead. If the request is superficial, ill-informed, and based on incomplete knowledge and understanding of what is truly needed, the divine realm can only provide a kind of first aid in a very general and superficial fashion and not do the deep healing and restoration that might truly be needed to solve the problem once and for all. So this practice can be comforting in creating a feeling of particular angels being a close ally and even a companion or friend, but there is much that is given up in the process through the limitation of the array of divine responses, that otherwise would be available.