Power of Prayer?

[The Flying Tench]

Certainly I would agree that a person who strongly believes he/she is a special case for divine intervention could well benefit from prayer (their own or others). It is just an extension of the "wholistic care" a patient ought to have in hospital - the lack of which is currently being discussed on the NHS thread. If the patient feels cared for, whether by nursing staff or "invisible friends" then that has to be a plus - also known as the placebo effect.

 

Well I would agree that if I was trying to explain rationalistically some of the 'healings' that happen this is the kind of line I would take, and in many cases it would be a credible explanation. Even so, some that I have been involved with personally you would be pushed to explain that way, and many I have read about it simply wouldn't work in my opinion. But I admit I haven't seen these personally. Part of the reason for my trip to Mozambique was to 'see a miracle' - to boost my own faith, I guess. I didn't. I discovered that the place where lots of miracles were being reported was a thousand miles further north where they were preaching the christian gospel for the first time to new villages. Things had quietened down in the south where I was. Nevertheless, I spoke to people who had seen and even been involved in remarkable miracles, such as blind people receiving their sight, though even there I realise i don't have medical reports - many, I would think, had never seen a doctor.

 

But even for some of the ones I have been involved with you would be pushed to explain it by placebo. I must be a bit careful about confidentiality, but keeping it vague and not too recent I can think of a lady who was an extreme alcoholic who had been into endless addiction units in mental hospitals with no success, but was healed by prayer and some light counselling. I find it hard to believe that our amateur counselling could really have been so far ahead of the trained psychiatrists. At the time it certainly seemed that prayer was an important constituent. Or a man who was dying in quite severe pain. I prayed for his total healing which didn't happen, but apparently, from the time I prayed, the pain greatly lessened and he had a vastly improved quality of life for the last few weeks of his life. He wasn't a churchgoer and I am sure he didn't see himself as 'a special case for divine intervention'.

 

But I'd like to make another point. Even if it were true that all these things could be explained by placebo or other psychological mechanisms, the effect is very positive. The argument was made by someone at the start of this thread that any religion will produce extremes such as the sad case in the first post in the thread, and therefore 'religion' is the problem. To make that argument you would need to balance the bad cases, which as far as I am aware are very few (though very serious when they occur), with the thousands of positive ones that occur every week in ordinary churches up and down the land.

 

John

[chesters1]

i was cured of smoking with nothing more than pills for 3 months .had i thought it would work would indeed be a miracle before i started

i cured myself really were the pills real? ,no one forced me to take them !who knows but god provided the tobacco and no amount of prayers from millions (through the years people have died smoking it) got him to kill the damned plant worldwide

 

god does not exist you know that ,the overall positive effect one may have perhaps does but positiveness doesn't need a god in reality just a general direction.

if god was that great why would he allow people to get sick? this is never thought off just the miracle when they no longer are ,crazy dangerous thinking!

 

if god was omnipotent why did he allow oil to form millions of years before his followers believe he formed the earth so it could be used to knock kids down with cars ?

is god careless with his planning or just plain negligent ?who needs a god like that.

why do people need a being to blame or praise for things that happen randomly and for no logical reason? ,its gods work / hand when nice things happen its his mysterious ways when bad things do ,laughable ,s.hit happens god or no god ,nice things too

Edited September 6, 2009 by chesters1

[Vagabond]

But even for some of the ones I have been involved with you would be pushed to explain it by placebo. I must be a bit careful about confidentiality, but keeping it vague and not too recent I can think of a lady who was an extreme alcoholic who had been into endless addiction units in mental hospitals with no success, but was healed by prayer and some light counselling. I find it hard to believe that our amateur counselling could really have been so far ahead of the trained psychiatrists.

 

Do not underestimate the "placebo" effect (and - for the pedantics - by that I mean I am misusing the term to include ANY positive action that the patient thinks is going to help - not just a dummy drug. That is merely to save a lot of typing) Tapping in to what for want of a better term you might call the patient's "will power" is just one of those actions. Perhaps this particular patient responded better to "light counselling" from people she perceived to be friendly than to all the heavy stuff she got from the shrinks. Your counselling was perhaps the trigger for her deciding of her own free will to make an effort to break the addiction.

 

Think about the many successes of Alcoholics Anonymous.

 

However, I am sure you will agree the first priority for a sick person is to get the best professional medical care available. The second priority is to see that person feeling "cared for" by wholistic nursing. If someone wants to add prayers to that, then that is up to them - but prayer should never be a substitute for proper medical care.

 

 

...and what is your view of the antithesis of the "placebo" effect, where a witchdoctor puts a curse on someone? - healthy people wither and die on occasion. OK, sometimes the witchdoctor helps things along with a bit of toad venom in the cursed one's mealies, but not always.

 

Did you get a look at Francis Galton's paper ?

[Guest Rabbit]

I'm not surprised you don't understand, given your history.

 

It is not the epilepsy that is the "racist" issue, but the identity of the religious figure whom ICI alleged to be epileptic. The sect concerned (not me) got very upset about the "insult" (as they perceived it) to their religious icon.

 

I have not mentioned the sect concerned, to avoid bringing "race" into it, but don't let lack of evidence influence your reaction!

 

Like I say it is not a racist issue for most, I accept that the 'sect' concerned might deem it so but for others it would not be.

That is why I find it odd that you feel inhibited to post with clarity. Hey Ho

[corydoras]

...but prayer should never be a substitute for proper medical care.

Amen to that

[The Flying Tench]

However, I am sure you will agree the first priority for a sick person is to get the best professional medical care available. The second priority is to see that person feeling "cared for" by wholistic nursing. If someone wants to add prayers to that, then that is up to them - but prayer should never be a substitute for proper medical care.

 

 

...and what is your view of the antithesis of the "placebo" effect, where a witchdoctor puts a curse on someone? - healthy people wither and die on occasion. OK, sometimes the witchdoctor helps things along with a bit of toad venom in the cursed one's mealies, but not always.

 

Did you get a look at Francis Galton's paper ?

 

I fully agree about the need to get proper medical care.

 

Re witch doctors, I believe some is the power of 'suggestion', but also I believe some of what happens is through some other force - possibly evil spirits. Certainly 'suggestion' alone cannot be the answer because sometimes people feel the effects before discovering that a curse has been put on them. In fact, this is usually the case.

 

Francis Galton's paper - have only looked briefly. Not too worried by the fact that people who are prayed for a lot in general terms don't live longer because I can't see any reason to think that God would choose such people to live longer - and prayer has to be in accordance with God's will. I can see the thrust of what he is saying more generally however. For example a lot of people who believe in prayer may ask to be spared swine flu, but I have wondered whether christians etc are any less likely to catch it than anyone else. I don't think that is part of the 'deal', so probably there is no difference, so such prayer may well be ineffective.

 

John

[Emma two]

Re witch doctors, I believe some is the power of 'suggestion', but also I believe some of what happens is through some other force - possibly evil spirits. John

 

Why do you believe the power of those who you call 'witch doctors' to come from evil spirits? The accounts of JC's miracles are the sort of things that shaman are reported to do in cultures uncontaminated by Abramnic mythology, why is their power negative and his not?

[The Flying Tench]

Why do you believe the power of those who you call 'witch doctors' to come from evil spirits? The accounts of JC's miracles are the sort of things that shaman are reported to do in cultures uncontaminated by Abramnic mythology, why is their power negative and his not?

I guess I was responding to Vagabond's comment about people being put under a curse, which seems to me to be evil.

 

I am sure you know much more about this scene than I do. Before I went to Mozambique I read a book by a non-christian author about a project she had set up in Mozambique, and she was positive about the contribution of the natural healers. Then when I went there all the stuff I heard about the 'witch doctors' was negative - curses and the like. I also read a shorter book, just a guide book really, saying there were different types of practitioner, i forget the Portuguese names, but distinguishing between the natural healers and the witch doctors. So I wondered if the natural healers were essentially good, while the witch doctors were evil? Anyone who puts curses on people is evil in my book. But maybe there is more overlap than I realise. It's not a subject I've ever researched properly I fully admit.

 

One of the things I was told was that if someone converted to christianity, and then became sick, they would sometimes go back to the witch doctor who would tell them that the problem was that they had offended against the traditions. They therefore needed to sleep with someone who was pure (the traditions had not been corrupted). That meant sleeping with a child. That may have been sincere advice, but I guess you would agree it is seriously wrong - i think one could say evil.

 

Jesus says you should judge a tree by its fruits. What I heard about the natural healers was essentially good fruit - effective healing remedies. But many of the cases I heard of dramatic 'christian' healings were after the gospel was preached in an animist village and people burnt their witchcraft charms and fetishes. Apparently there was always an amazing outbreak of healings - the deaf hearing, the blind receiving their sight, the paralysed getting up from their beds etc. I spoke to people who had witnessed this firsthand. The clear implication was that witchcraft had kept people under a spell of sickness.

 

I can well believe the christian (including my) understanding of the witchcraft scene is oversimplified. I can believe there is a good side I have not heard enough about. But the information I have had to date definitely points to a side which it would be fair to describe as evil.

 

John

[Vagabond]

Re witch doctors, I believe some is the power of 'suggestion', but also I believe some of what happens is through some other force - possibly evil spirits. Certainly 'suggestion' alone cannot be the answer because sometimes people feel the effects before discovering that a curse has been put on them.

 

Hence my remark (only partially facetious) about helping the victim along with toad venom in his mealies. If I were a witch doctor I would trust poison rather than an invisible ally. Naturally, I do not share your belief in "evil spirits" (other than waragi - made by distilling banana wine and fortifying the result with meths ) and would invoke auto-suggestion and poison rather than the supernatural.

 

Francis Galton's paper ....... Not too worried by the fact that people who are prayed for a lot in general terms don't live longer because I can't see any reason to think that God would choose such people to live longer - and prayer has to be in accordance with God's will.

 

John, if prayer "has to be in accordance with God's will" what is the point of that prayer in the first place? By that logic the event prayed for is going to happen anyway.

 

Most Christian people who are terminally ill get extensively prayed for, but die anyway. (the same obviously applies to many other religions) So presumably the prayers for life to be spared are in effect an attempt to change divine will. Attempting to change "divine will" seems pretty futile, and might even be seen as a form of blasphemy, although it would take a brave (or foolish) pastor to say so.

 

I suppose an acceptable prayer might be phrased "grant xxx peace". Then either recovery or death could be seen as a prayer answered.

Edited September 9, 2009 by Vagabond

[Vagabond]

Like I say it is not a racist issue for most, I accept that the 'sect' concerned might deem it so but for others it would not be.

By "most" I suppose you mean yourself (another form of the Royal "we"?)

 

The effect of the dispute in question was a storm that extended way outside the original teacup and is just ONE of many factors contributing to the present world situation.

 

I am curious to know why the word "racist" always produces the same result. In whatever sense or context the word is used, out rushes PC Rabbit and arrests the first person in sight.