Does Prayer Change God's Mind?

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I don’t think it’s a matter of changing His mind…I think it’s more of a matter of mercy granted.
 
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I think God answers prayers when we strive to do his will. So I would say that prayer probably changes us; more than it would change God.
 
No, prayer does not change God’s mind, as God is absolutely immutable. It is a dogma of faith that there is no change in God, so it is impossible for God to “change his mind”, otherwise, he would not be God.

This question actually touches on the mystery of Divine Providence, itself an area of study in theology. The order of grace is fixed and eternal, and any answers to prayer are already part of that eternal order. Put as simply as possible, a prayer is “answered” because God has made the outcome contingent upon that prayer, but since there is also no change in Divine Providence, given that it is not external to God, even the prayer, being an action moved by grace, is itself a part of that providence.

It’s impossible to condense this mystery into a single post: volumes can be written on this question and other questions corollary to it. But that’s kinda the gist of it.
 
I love this question. It is a hard one and kind of like an inception one for me. I’ve read in numerous places what was already stated above:
  • Its our mind, not God’s, that will change
  • God’s mind is not changing, its our heart that is becoming more open to God’s grace
  • It is possible for God to change a decision already made, see Abraham’s prayer of intercession, but that was already a divine possibility
Not sure it is possible to fully know how God’s mind works. In fact, one could say that if he did something unexpected it was because it was already within his will. As for the comments on divine providence, I think there is so much latitude in which God preserves creation and natural order that what might seem like a huge shift to us is actually nothing that would impact that preservation.
 
This. It is SUCH an immense subject that has been studied by countless theologians and philosophers and so many books have been written over it. You’d have to study the subject for years, and even then, the answer is still not clear.
 
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