Healing by prayer
Effectiveness of "distant healing" prayer:
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Quotes:
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"During the past two decades, a spate of intercessory prayer studies
has shown only a small or statistically insignificant effect. The findings
have been highly controversial, with skeptics charging that the methodology
is flawed." Stacey Chase, Science & Theology News. 1
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"It must be emphasized that, in the entire
history of modern science, no claim of any type of supernatural phenomena
has ever been replicated under strictly controlled conditions." Bruce
Flamm, clinical professor of obstetrics and gynecology. 2
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Controversy about the use of distant healing prayer:Prayer at a distance, (a.k.a. distance healing, intercessory prayer, remote healing,
anonymous prayer, etc.) involves a person or a team praying on behalf of an
individual who might be some distance away, and a stranger. Its effectiveness is controversial:
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Dr. Gary Posner, a skeptic says that most remote prayer studies to date have
been sloppy and untrustworthy. He said:
"I suspect that 50 years from
now people looking back at this genre of prayer research will kind of
shake their heads and call it junk science."
Chance alone, he says,
might account for the effect that they thought was due to the prayer.
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Popular spirituality author Dr. Deepak Chopra says that prayer experiments are
supporting what he's been saying all along: There are healing forces in
nature that science is only beginning to understand. He said:
"At the
moment, I would agree that some of these studies are tentative, that we
should be cautious in the way we interpret the results. But the studies
are encouraging enough that we should pursue them, because if we don't, we
may have missed one of the most amazing phenomena in nature." 3
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Topics covered in this section:
The following information sources were used to prepare and update the above
essay. The hyperlinks are not necessarily still active today.
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Stacey Chase, "Does prayer research have a prayer?," Science &
Theology News, 2005-SEP-07, at: http://www.stnews.org/
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B.L. Flamm, "The Columbia University 'Miracle' Study:
Flawed and Fraud," Skeptical Inquirer, 2004-SEP.
Copyright © 1996 to 2010 by Ontario
Consultants on Religious Tolerance
Originally written: 1996-JAN-14
Latest update: 2010-NOV-05
Author: B.A. Robinson
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