Saturday, May 8, 2010

Do Prayers Work?

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 Propping up my bike before going to church


Recently, I had a talk with someone who believed in the efficacy of prayer.  I have for years been arguing that prayers don't work.  One can come to that conclusion through a process of logic but of course a proper study would be helpful.  During the discussion, I recalled a study done by a Harvard research team that showed that prayer was not effective when it came to healing.  I looked up my trusty gmail in which I store facts that catch my fancy and sure enough, I had the link to the Harvard study: Harvard Medical School

If you prefer a more readable newspaper-like article, here's a link to the NY Times reporting this: New York Times

And here are the links to Medline searches on the study: Medline 1
and Medline 2

All I can say is if I'm having a heart surgery I should pray real hard that nobody prays for me.  Or if they do, I should not be told of it.  Prayers can be harmful to healing or at best, they're just plain useless.

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