Prayer is useless?

"Pray...but keep rowing the boat." ~ from my wife.

On a Buddhist list, the following article was posted about a study that concluded that there is 'No health benefit' for the sick that have been prayed for. I will not agree or disagree with this study, as I make no claim to be the mouthpiece of God or to be able to answer the unanswerable. No, my specialty is in 'practical application' and not speculation. I will say that praying for others or sending them metta blessings of loving kindness as the Buddhists do will most definitely have a positive effect on the person that does the praying or blessing. The bible tells us that God's way is not man's way, so we must leave it at that when we pray. The only thing we must be concerned with is our effort and authenticity in prayer. Whether or not the recipient benefits from our prayers is not in our hands. As you instill seeds of peace within others you plant the same seeds and water these seeds within you as well. As you give so you receive. Proverbs 27:17 says "Iron sharpens iron; so a man sharpens his friend's countenance." So even if the recipient does not benefit from my efforts, I will benefit from them.

Sometime misguided persons work in a direction opposite of prayer or good will blessing by trying to curse or tear down others. Whenever we take it upon ourselves to beat down others, we are headed in a direction of destroying peace. We destroy our own peace as well as others peace. And even if our 'curse' has no effect on another, the same way that our prayer may not. Our curse or ill will towards of another will surely become a curse for us. Is this because of Karma or the Wrath of God? No, it is just how the nature of energy works. It takes no energy from me to pass something by and leave it alone in peace. But it takes my energy as well as my peace to pick something up to destroy it. "Good thoughts and actions can never produce bad results. Bad thoughts and actions can never produce good results. This is but saying that nothing can come from corn but corn, nothing from nettles but nettles. Men understand this law in the natural world, and work with it. But few understand it in the mental and moral world" ~ James Allen. All this talk of prayer reminded me on an old post I wrote "The Definition of a Miracle is the Suspension of Natural Law." I've included it at the end for your perusal.


"No health benefit from prayer" (No claim as to accuracy of article)

Patients did not know they were prayed for. The world's largest study into the effects of prayer on patients undergoing heart surgery has found it appears to make no difference. The MANTRA study, run from Duke University Medical Center in North Carolina, involved 750 patients. Before their operations, they were randomly split into two groups, and half were prayed for by Christians, Jews, Buddhists and Muslims. However, checks revealed they had fared no better than those not prayed for. The results of the controversial study contradict earlier findings from the same team which suggested a drop of a quarter or more in "adverse outcomes" - including death, heart failure or heart attack. However, that trial involved only 150 patients, and the more extensive research, completed this year, found no evidence of any benefits.

The study is the subject of a BBC "Everyman" documentary to be broadcast next week. Prayer groups asked God to intervene. Prayer teams from various denominations and faiths were alerted by email to start intercessory prayer as soon as possible after the patient was enrolled on the trial. Neither hospital staff, the patients, or their relatives had any idea which patients' were receiving prayer, to prevent any chance of the results being skewed. After the patients had undergone an angioplasty procedure, in which a balloon is insterted into a heart artery and inflated to clear an obstruction, they were followed for six months to see how they progressed. 'Unwise test' Many theologians say that, even if you believe in the power of intercessory prayer, such a trial is doomed to failure because it "puts God to the test" - and there are clear instructions in the Bible not to do this.

The Bishop of Durham is critical of the experiment The Bishop of Durham, the Rt Rev Tom Wright, said: "Prayer is not a penny in the slot machine. "You can't just put in a coin and get out a chocolate bar. "This is like setting an exam for God to see if God will pass it or not." Other experts are highly critical of the concept that the benefits of prayer might be "dose-dependent" - that is, that the benefits might increase as the number of people praying went up. This is particularly important, as Duke University is at the centre of the US "Bible belt" - and many of the trial participants, regardless of whether they were randomised to receive prayer during the trial, would be getting it from relatives and friends - and of course themselves. Dr Richard Sloan, from the New York Presbyterian Hospital, described the concept of a prayer "dose" as "absurd". He said: "It requires us to abandon our understanding of the physical universe."

end of article


"The Definition of a Miracle is the Suspension of Natural Law" written for a 12 step group

An acquaintance sent me "The Golden Key" by Emmet Fox. I was turned off after reading the first paragraph, but decided to read the rest. I'm glad I did read it all, as the last sentence of it is a great reminder of how spiritual laws work. What did turn me off was the senders and the writers blanket guarantee of "...do exactly what it says, and if you are persistent enough you will overcome any difficulty" and "...scientific prayer will enable you, sooner or later, to get yourself, or anyone else, out of any difficulty on the face of the earth - it is the Golden Key to harmony and happiness."

There is nothing wrong with prayer and meditating on God or your Higher Power unless we use it as an "escape vehicle" the same way we used our addictive distractions to help blind us from the life we have created. Why do many of us want to be blinded from life and need distractions to escape what is? A lot of it is due to the fact we have created ugly lives for us to reside in. I had to completely restructure my life to find peace in it. Many of the old ways had to be let go off, otherwise nothing would have changed for me other than for things to keep getting worse. Other times it might be more of an ADD thing. When I catch myself escaping life I work to bring my thoughts back to the present moment. I do a lot of prayer and meditation myself, although, my meditation is along the lines of AA's Step 11 ..."praying only for God's will and the power to carry it out," more so than asking for specific demands. But, as an addict in numerous additive areas, I have to be wary of unrealistic "blanket guarantees" and "magic bullets" that give me an unrealistic sense of entitlement and will give me free reign do as I wish and think I can violate the 3 branches of laws that govern us without paying the price.

If I want to meditate on God / HP, it is now from my own choice and not because of being forced to concentrate on something else to escape from dealing with the problems that living a wrong life has given me. Sure, we all make mistakes and emergencies pop up, but if these emergencies and global disasters in our lives are on a daily and continuous basis we need to step back and see why we have been blessed with such a life. Most of the time the answer is that our life is a direct result of our actions and how we choose to live our life. Usually this path to living the life we have chosen is a defiant one - defiant against one or all three of the branches of laws that govern us. I find that sometime overly spiritual practitioners neglect the natural laws that govern our bodies and suffer in this area from lack of living a balanced life. The Bible tells us Jesus said to "give to Caesar what is Caesar's and to give to God what is God's." (from my memory and stated more or less) This implies we need to seek balance and not live by all or none standards in most cases. Some of us forget we are spiritual beings residing in physical bodies living in physical world and as such are governed by the following 3 branches of laws:

1 - Natural or physical laws

2 - Man made laws

3 - Divine or spiritual laws

Now, if your an atheist or agnostic, you may not think much of divine law but you still have to answer to natural and man made laws. Some people say they can defy man made laws as well as divine laws, but no matter how defiant the person or addict is - no one escapes natural laws. To be successful in life we have to put some effort in spiritual work and some effort in physical work for a good balance as well as be mindful of not violating manmade laws. It is by restructuring my life to accept and live within all these laws that I have been able to find much peace...by living within my means. My prior life was just the opposite. I lived a life that violated all 3 branches of these laws. As I wrote in my earlier post 'Putting Peace First'..."all our actions have consequences and many of these actions are producing consequences that rob us of inner peace." If we expect to escape from the consequences of ALL our actions - that is delusional thinking. Desire plays a big part in guiding our actions. If we have a constant supply of never ending desires that end in the disruption of our peace what chance have we to find serenity? To find peace I had to rework my life when it came to excessive desires as well as being mindful of living within these 3 branches of laws.

There is no one magic bullet in life that will fix all our problems. Living a good life is composed of many qualities and when we reach for one thing only with thoughts of disregarding the rest of life's laws we will be out of balance. To be at peace is a natural ability that is instilled within us all - you only have to become balanced to be at peace. Proportionality and balance used to be taught in ancient Greek educational curriculum. Unfortunately, these studies have gone the way of the dinosaurs. The Buddha also reminds of the importance of balance with the idea of seeking the middle path. I am a Christian - Buddhist - Taoist and believe in God but I also know we have free choice in life and if I am constantly working against God or a Higher Power as well as violating natural laws and man made laws by how I live my life I cannot ask God to constantly keep fixing my messes I voluntarily make. well I guess I could keep asking, but only a real sick person would keep hitting themselves in the head with a hammer and then complaining they have a headache?

My wife mentioned to me the saying, "Pray, but keep rowing the boat." This is the solution that lead us to peace, via the tools of footwork and acceptance. We have to work with God / HP and not against. If you still don't understand what I am saying I will give you an example. One fellow is a drug addict, alcoholic, compulsive spender, sex addict, gambler, rageaholic, overeater and workaholic prays to get off drugs and alcohol, get rich and lose the fat. His workaholic tendencies stem from being in love with money too much. He likes to gamble large sums and lives a so called rich life of expensive cars, extramarital affairs and other material trinkets. Money boosts his self esteem and as treasurer for his company he has doctored the books and has stolen large amounts of money from his company over the years to help pay for his drug habit, gambling loses a mistresses and his spending binges. He refuses to get more than 4 or 5 hours sleep a night and eats junk foods all the time, never exercises as he sees this as waste of time - time that could be used to get more money. When he cannot get enough money to feed his cravings he take it out on his wife or mistress beating them thinking that will relieve some of his misery.

Money is his real God, yet he thinks that he can pray to another God to get him off drugs and booze to make him thin and rich without changing a thing with how he lives his life on his end. He has no clew about accepting and living within his comfortable means. He never makes time to go to recovery meetings and his marriage is a mess and his kids are getting into trouble and drugs just like the dad for lack of any parental direction. Eventually his employer finds out he has stolen massive amounts of money. He loses his house, his cars and his mistress and he goes to jail. In jail he suffers a heart attack from high blood pressure. His family decomposes and his wife divorces him. His kids leave home and end up on the street, addicted to drugs. All these problems this man suffers were from his free will and by his refusing to accept the 3 branches of law and his refusal to accept and live within his comfortable means...they are all consequences to his actions. Whenever we steal something we are refusing to accept and live within our means and this also applies to when we stretch our abilities and this causes us or others injury. The same way a bodybuilder uses steroids to further their muscle growth by unnatural methods, the addict use various drugs, addictions and crutches to allow them to live a life that would not be attainable by natural (UN-drugged) methods only. This is why the 12 and 12 stresses living right size on pages 122-125 as a prerequisite to finding recovery. We can get something, but we have to give up something in the process ... we have to give up our old sick life.

The definition of a miracle is: "the suspension of natural law" as defined by the philosopher David Hume. And, while we can pray for a miracle now and again, to ask God / HP for a continuos stream of daily miracles due to the fact that we refuse to live by the 3 branches of laws that governs us is unrealistic. Can you see how it would be futile to say you can say certain prayer and be able to eat 5000 calories a day and not get fat when your caloric balance point is 1600 calories? Yet, may people in Overeaters Anonymous do it. They ask for a daily suspension of natural law so they can fulfill their eating desires. In Debtors Anonymous we have the debtors that refuse to live within their financial budgets, they keep on knowingly debting, writing bad checks, stealing and are always praying for quick money fixes from God without changing anything on their end of the bargain. It is the same with all the other branches of 12 step programs whether AA, NA, GA, CLA or any of the "S" programs. People disregard natural law, man made laws and divine laws and then look for special hall passes from God / HP to continually save them from paying the price they must pay to violate life's laws. It seems that many of us get stuck with looking for hope of change someplace else other than within us. All change is ultimately internal in nature, but we have hopes that someone else will do it for us as a quick fix, rather than we doing it ourselves. We can get stuck with feeling that any good change in our lives will come from the outside -- as a gift from God / HP and without much effort from ones own self to change. Some us get more miracles handed to us than others, but to be in a position to continually have to pray for miracles is a signpost for me I am not living life right and not working a good recovery program on my end.

If the forwarded mail I received said "pray for the *willingness* to change" - then this is something I would agree with. The addict dying in jail that I mentioned above would get better results if he prayed for the right thing...the willingness to accept and live within his comfortable means, the willingness to stop being a workaholic and accept natural and man made laws instead of just praying to get rich and thin? He might pray for the willingness to live right size, tell his ego to stand down, get some sleep, make time to do some exercise and eat right, not steal and be there for his family and wife? Now, if he prayed for the right thing he might get an answer. The last sentence of The Golden Key says: "You want to get out of your difficulty----that is sufficient. You do your half and God will never fail to do His." Well, this is the key for me, but we must make some effort or change in conjunction to our prayers. If we are praying with one breath and violating those prayers with actions that will void such prayers we are spinning our wheels and getting nowhere. It would be nice if we received a blanket guarantee that if we thought about God full time that would be enough to fix us but it doesn't seem work out that way. It takes action as well as thinking to do it. You see this a lot in the news nowadays. Certain so called religious persons talking about God with one breath and killing others with the next breath.

The serenity prayer tells us we have 2 paths - change or acceptance. Whenever our own actions are involved, these actions have the possibility of change in them. If what we pray about is out of our area of action, that is a different story, then we are powerless and must release it. But, many of such "out of reach" areas might seem so on the surface, yet our actions still have a definite effect on these seemingly powerless areas of change if we contemplate on them. Just as the Buddhist follow the Eightfold Path of "right" actions, addicts and spiritual practitioners must follow the same path of "right" prayer and actions. But, to pray for a suspension of natural, manmade and divine laws day in and day out is not practical way of working a recovery program. With my own 12 step practice and various other religious and philosophical views I don't ask for miracles too much from God / HP anymore. If I did this would presuppose that I knew better than God / HP what is good for me. Instead I turn it all over as step 11 says ... praying only for knowledge of God's will and the power to carry it out. I also apply the serenity prayer and change what I can and work to accept the rest. If you are an atheist or agnostic you might adopt the Taoist view of "going with the flow" Here is an old Taoist story to illustrates this.

"...an old Chinese farmer lost his best stallion one day and his neighbor came around to express his regrets, but the farmer just said, "Who knows what is good and what is bad." The next day the stallion returned bringing with him 3 wild mares. The neighbor rushed back to celebrate with the farmer, but the old farmer simply said, "Who knows what is good and what is bad." The following day, the farmer's son fell from one of the wild mares while trying to break her in and broke his arm and inured his leg. The neighbor came by to check on the son and give his condolences, but the old farmer just said, "Who knows what is good and what is bad." The next day the army came to the farm to conscript the farmer's son for the war, but found him invalid and left him with his father. The neighbor thought to himself, "Who knows what is good and what is bad."

I hope you can make use of this tool of evaluating the 3 branches of laws that govern us in your recovery travels to help you see things clearly. Spiritual tools are very important to living a peaceful life as well as an addiction recovery tool, but when someone offers you a tool, spiritual or otherwise, that claims will allow you to violate natural, man made and divine laws with a blanket guarantee for immunity you should be cautious. As I mentioned above, the last line of the Golden Key offers good advice: "You want to get out of your difficulty----that is sufficient. You do your half and God will never fail to do His." Prayer to God / HP for the willingness to change while doing the footwork to change your life in a positive direction ... and whatever the result accept it gratefully as God's / HP's will as the serenity prayer mentions.

Below is the forwarded mail I received.

(...) writes:

Read the Golden Key several times. DO exactly what it says, and if
you are persistent enough you will overcome any difficulty.

THE GOLDEN KEY by Emmet Fox

Scientific prayer will enable you, sooner or later, to get yourself, or
anyone else, out of any difficulty on the face of the earth. It is the
Golden Key to harmony and happiness.

To those who have no acquaintance with the mightiest power in existence,
this may appear to be a rash claim, but it needs only a fair trial to prove
that, without a shadow of doubt, it is a just one. You need take no one's
word for it, and you should not. Simple try it for yourself, and see.

God is omnipotent, and man and woman is God's image and likeness,
and has dominion over all things. This is the inspired teaching, and it
is intended to be taken literally, at its face value. Man/Woman means
everyone, so the ability to draw on this power is not the special
prerogative of the Mystic or the Saint, as is so often supposed, or even
of the highly-trained practitioner. Whoever you are, wherever you may
be, The Golden Key to harmony is in your hand now. This is because in
scientific prayer it is God who works, and not you, and so your
particular limitations or weaknesses are of no account in the process.
You are only the channel through which the Divine action takes place, and
your treatment will be just the getting of yourself out of the way.
Beginners often get startling results at the first time of trying, for all
that is absolutely essential is to have an open mind, and sufficient faith
to try the experiment. Apart form that, you may hold any views on
religion, or none.

As for the actual method of working, like all fundamental things, it
is simplicity itself. All that you have to do is this:
STOP THINKING ABOUT THE DIFFICULTY, WHATEVER
IT IS, AND THINK ABOUT GOD INSTEAD. This is the complete
rule, and if only you will do this, the trouble, whatever it is, will
presently disappear. It makes no difference what kind of trouble it is. It
may be a big thing or a little thing; it may concern health, finance, a law
suit, a quarrel, an accident, or anything else conceivable; but whatever
it is, just stop thinking about tit, and think of God instead----that is
all you have to do.

The thing could not be simpler, could it? God could scarcely have
made it simpler, and yet it never fails to work when given a fair
trial. Do not try to form a picture of God, which is, of course, impossible.
work by rehearsing anything or everything that you know about
God. God is wisdom, Truth, inconceivable Love. God is present
everywhere; has infinite power; knows everything; and so on.
It matters not how well you may think you understand these things;
go over them repeatedly.

But you must stop thinking of the trouble, whatever it is. The
rule is to think about God, and if you are thinking about your
difficulty you are not thinking about God. To be continually
glancing over your shoulder, as it were, in order to see how
matters are progressing, is fatal, because that is thinking of the
trouble, and you must think of God, and of nothing else. Your
object is to drive the thoughts of the difficulty right out of your
consciousness, for a few moments at least, substituting for it
the thought of God. This is the crux of the whole thing. If you
can become so absorbed in this consideration of the spiritual
world that you really forget for a while all about the trouble
concerning which you began to pray, you will presently find that
you are safely and comfortably out of your difficulty---that your
demonstration is made.

In order to "Golden Key" a troublesome person or a difficult
situation, think, "Now I am going to 'Golden Key' John, or
Mary, or that threatened danger"; then proceed to drive all
thoughts of John, or Mary, or the danger right out of your mind,
replacing it by the thought of God.

By working in this way about a person, you are not seeking to
influence her/his conduct in any way, except that you prevent her
from injuring or annoying you, and you do her nothing but good.
Thereafter she is certain to be in some degree a better, wiser,
and more spiritual person, just because you have "Golden
Keyed" her. A pending lawsuit or other difficulty would probably
fade out harmlessly without coming to a crisis, a justice being
done to all parties concerned.

If you find you can do this very quickly, you may repeat
the operation several times a day with intervals in between.
Be sure, however, each time you have done it, that you drop
all thought of the matter until the next time. This is important.

We have said that the Golden Key is simple, and so it is,
but, of course, it is not always easy to turn. If you are very
frightened or worried it may be difficult, at first, to get your
thoughts away from material things. But by constantly repeating
some statement of absolute Truth that appeals to you, such as
THERE IS NO POWER BUT GOD, or, I AM THE CHILD
OF GOD, FILLED AND SURROUNDED BY THE PERFECT
PEACE OF GOD, or, GOD IS LOVE, or, GOD IS GUIDING
ME NOW, or perhaps best and simplest of all, just GOD IS
WITH ME------however mechanical or dead it may seem at
first ------ you will soon find that the treatment has begun to
"take," and that your mind is clearing. Do not struggle violently;
be quiet but insistent. Each time that you find your attention
wandering, just switch it straight back to God.

Do not try to think out in advance what the solution of your
difficulty will probably turn out to be. This is technically called
"outlining" and will only delay the demonstration. Leave the
question of ways and means strictly to God. You want to
get out of your difficulty----that is sufficient. You do your
half and God will never fail to do His.

End of quote



Take Care,