Does prayer have the power to heal?

[Captain Awesome]

If you pray backwards, does it hurt?

[Nebula]

[Mr. Personality]

Prayer doesn't work. I prayed for healing of Clifford Olson's cancer, but didn't happen.

Obviously God is too smart to be tricked by the likes of you.

[Fancy]

Prayer doesn't heal - faith in oneself may.

[Thinktank]

Prayer Does Not Work said my uncle. Of course it doesn't work
for some people. And for other people, prayer works. but not all the time.



.

[Nebula]

It doesn't work, period. Take a random group of praying people who want something and someone is bound to get what they want. That person will state prayer works. Silly reasoning.

[Born_again]

Prayer worked for me when I needed my first pair of rugby boots. In fact, the boots were uncannily like the ones that I'd pointed out to my Mum in a thrift store days earlier. Fancy that for a coincidence!

[steven lloyd]

I used to pray for a bike.

Then I realized God and prayer didn't work that way, so I stole a bike and prayed for forgiveness.

[cliffy1]

“Among all my patients ... over thirty five ... there has not been one whose problem in the last resort was not that of finding a religious outlook on life. It is safe to say that every one of them fell ill because he lost (it)...and none of them has really been healed who did not regain his religious outlook. This of course has nothing whatever to do with a particular creed or membership of a church." Carl Jung

In 1980 I was hit by a logging truck doing 60 miles an hour while on a snowmobile. While lying in the hospital one morning, I felt a very powerful wave of energy pulse through my body. Later, after I got out of the hospital, I discovered from several different sources, that that morning, most of the various congregations in our town had been praying for my recovery.

Now, I am not a religious person, but I had spent hundreds of hours discussing religious beliefs with just about every group, including Baha'is, Mormons and JWs. I just add that to explain why so many prayed. It was not because they held any special love for me. In fact I spent most of my discussion trying to convince them they didn't know their *bleep* from holes in the ground.

But, from a metaphysical point of view, Prayer is a form of meditation and sets up a certain frequency. When combined with the thoughts of many, the frequency takes on pretty powerful dimensions. When focused on a particular person, it is like a magnifying glass focusing sun light onto paper, causing it to ignite. A similar thing happens when faith healers, through talking to the congregation to focus their energy on him/her causing energy to be channeled to a sick person. Spontaneous healing can occur. This has nothing to do with the deities invoked, just the focus of energy. The same thing can be accomplished by invoking the Flying Spaghetti Monster or Kermit the Frog.

[Nebula]

Well cliffy, here's the thing. You say prayer (in so far as the ability to focus energy) works, because of your example.

However... I'll bet many other things happened that morning and you could attribute your betterment to any of them, all with the same level of evidence (none at all).

For instance, a young child could have kissed her mom that morning. It could be said that when a child kisses her mom, good things happen. It's just as plausible as saying a bunch of people prayed and you got better.

[cliffy1]

Well cliffy, here's the thing. You say prayer (in so far as the ability to focus energy) works, because of your example.

However... I'll bet many other things happened that morning and you could attribute your betterment to any of them, all with the same level of evidence (none at all).

For instance, a young child could have kissed her mom that morning. It could be said that when a child kisses her mom, good things happen. It's just as plausible as saying a bunch of people prayed and you got better.

Well, my example is just one of many that I have experienced, not just for myself, but I have witnessed many spontaneous healings. Some involved faith healers, some involved aboriginal medicine men and women, some through spiritual healers and others through alternative healing methods such as foot reflexology, acupressure and acupuncture.

But I don't expect anybody to believe me just because I say it happened to me or I witnessed it in others. What I do know is that people can only experience what they can accept in their reality based on their beliefs. If you don't believe it is possible, then you won't experience it. At first I was a skeptic but I made a conscious decision to keep an open mind and suspend my beliefs at a particular event, and I was astounded by what I experienced (but that is for another time).

[Nebula]

I can tell you that the James Randi Foundation has a standing offer of (i think) $1 million to anyone who can prove this sort of thing.

I will start to change my way of thinking when amputees spontaneously grow new limbs.

[1nick]

I was pretty sick these last few months.
Didn't pray once,got better.

[Nebula]

Shocking.

[fluffy]

I think prayer is just one way of purging fear from the psyche. There are a number of similar tools, most without the religious associations, all of which have the effect of lowering ambient stress levels in the body allowing its natural functions to perform with better efficiency. Call it what you want, a life without drama just runs smoother in a lot of aspects.