So, is prayer effective?

The news is all over the place about the latest most comprehensive research on the healing effectiveness of prayer. (The New York Times and The Christian Science Monitor give a most thorough look at all the issues this new study addresses. )

Reading various reports of this research, I am sure that churches and pray-ers (like me!) all over the world were hoping for results that verify and broadcast what they have always known to be true and, likewise, I can imagine that pharmaceutical companies were probably hoping for the opposite, so more will choose drugs over prayer!

In this recent study of cardiology patients, the concept of prayer has been a little more refined than other studies, but it still looks so very different than the way I pray.

My hope is that the studies will continue as they refine their ideas of what prayer is. I also hope that it will soon become evident that prayers and pills aren't synonymous. One doesn't pop a prayer in quite the same way that one pops a pill.

A pill or medical procedure has a specific job to make adjustments to specific parts of the body in an effort to adjust the body to healthy levels of functioning.

A prayer is employed to be both broad and specific, perhaps one may start to pray to cure an illness, but in the process prayer awakens compassion, removes fear, reveals connections, uncovers hidden truths, brings out confessions and forgiveness, resolves into redemption and in many cases brings cure. And this is only part of what prayer does.

A pill or medical procedure has a specific dose and process, is controlled and recorded and signed so that there is no question as to how much is taken, how long a procedure is done and who was involved.

A prayer is driven by desire, intuition and/or tradition, is often addressed to a power higher than oneself, and leaves lasting impressions on the heart. Who is involved in prayer? The cloistered nuns who pray the perpetual rosary for the world? The little girl saying her good night prayers? The Christian Science practitioner who gives specific Christian Science treatment? The prayer team at the local hospital praying over the prayer requests from patients? The millions who pray to Allah? Who controls this prayer? And what is a successful outcome ? And who determines that? There is very little that current scientific methodology can control when it comes to prayer.

The prayer that I am most familiar with is the prayer taught in Christian Science. Here the differences between scientific prayer and medical science are acutely different.

Medical science is based on material sense evidence, Christian Science is based on the premise that man is spiritual.

When I was in the hospital for the births of my children, I was required to sign a waiver saying that I recognize that medical science is not an exact science. Christian Science is an absolute science.

Christian Science starts from the basis of perfect God and perfect man, much as mathematics starts out with its principles. From there it works out the problems of being.

So, is prayer effective?

I have found it to be so. It never leaves me where I started from mentally. There is growth - sometimes effortlessly so, sometimes with great effort. And there are changes physically - sometimes immediately, sometimes after a long period of time. I have been healed through prayer of many things: warts on the feet, second degree burns, as well as have had help and comfort during a divorce, was delivered from life threatening situations and have found peace in stressful situations.

There are no formulaes however. Each prayer follows healing principles taught by Christ Jesus, but the form in which they take are as unique and custom-made as the individuals requesting prayer. I have prayed with tears and with dancing. I have prayed through doubt, and prayed with confidence. I have had instantaneous healings and healings that took place over time. The results are always growth and transformation in some part of my life.

Laura Matthews has some interesting insights on this study as well.

I like to close with this quote from The New York Times article mentioned above. This response really resonates with how I feel:

"...Bob Barth, the spiritual director of Silent Unity, the Missouri prayer ministry, said the findings would not affect the ministry's mission.

"A person of faith would say that this study is interesting," Mr. Barth said, "but we've been praying a long time and we've seen prayer work, we know it works, and
the research on prayer and spirituality is just getting started."

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