ROCHESTER, MINN., Dec. 12, 2001—A study that appears in the December issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings outlines the importance of religion and spirituality in medicine with many patients, but notes it is difficult to prove that the result is better health from intercessory prayer—prayer by one or more people on behalf of another.
Mayo Clinic researchers found that their study of intercessory prayer had no significant effect on patients' medical outcomes after hospitalization in a coronary care unit.
The single-center, randomized, double-blind, controlled trial was conducted at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., between July 4, 1997 and Oct. 21, 1999, among 799 male and female patients aged 18 years or older, who were admitted to Saint Mary’s Hospital coronary care unit and were discharged with a cardiovascular diagnosis.
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I've known for a long time that prayer doesn't work. I tried it to jump start my mediocre life when I was on my own in my late teens and early to mid 20's. In my mid 20's prayer didn't save my marriage, and in my 30's prayer didn't end the suffering of my late father-in-law. What Christians would say to me is that my prayers were answered, just not in the way I thought they should be, but that's not the promise that is in the bible:
Matthew 21:21-22 (King James Version)
21 Jesus answered and said unto them, Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; it shall be done.
22 And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.
So according to the bible, and this is the KJV, whatever I asked for, being that I believed with all my heart, should have been granted to me.
During this time I began to notice that things would happened to me, whether I prayed for them or not, in a random fashion. So I quit praying and still good things and bad things happened at an amazingly random pattern. Having stopped praying I figured out that if I made better decisions more good things happened than bad things. Then I did research about the decisions I was making and I was able to increase the good things that happened to me and decrease by a huge margin the bad things. I noticed that rational and critical thinking trumped prayer every time.
Then a horrible thing happened to us. My husband's father had a stroke and went into a deep coma. For over a week he lingered in hospice, just laying there with his eyes shut and his mouth wide open. It was distressing to watch and the only thing that occupied my mind was that he had to die to be at peace. So at 36 I started to pray again. I prayed for God to end his suffering and to end ours as well. I prayed for about 5 or 6 days before I finally gave up. Obviously there is no one that could do anything that was listening and the only person that could do anything legally was God, so either he didn't care or he didn't exist. The God I was brought up to believe was a caring God so that part was eliminated from the equation. That left only one conclusion, God didn't exist. I never prayed again.
Shortly after that event my husband had to undergo triple bypass surgery. I went into this situation as an educated person by asking lots of questions and finding out that my husband's surgical team was one of the best in the country. By this time prayer was a meaningless act of desperation so it never occurred to me to engage in it. As anticipated, the surgery went well, my husband had no complications because of his young age and good health, all factors which were explained in great detail to me.
In conclusion, I realize the world can sometimes be a scary and unpredictable place. Being well informed and flexible, rational and unemotional, can only do so much to ensure that life is good. But prayer is just wishful thinking and can hold a person back from realizing his true nature!
1 comment:
But MC Hammer said "You got to pray just to make it today!"
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