Poll: Does Prayer Have Effect?

[in_servitude]

Scenario: You have been placed in a small space craft orbiting Earth. You are all by yourself in this space craft. There are no windows and no way to communicate physically with the world outside the spacecraft.

In this scenario, what effect can your prayers really have?

 

[pwlj_christ87]

i more strongly now than ever have expierenced and witnessed the power of prayer, not only as communicating but for GOD to literally intercede in our lives. as long as the prayers are in line with god’s will then they have tremendous effect…

i have seen prayers answered such as healing people of alcoholism and drugs, increasing my own fiath, my character, i have seen others starting to find interest in god

 

[bsroufek]

This is reminiscent of the Muslim belief (I think) that when they are outside of their homeland,
God doesn’t see them, so they can drink alcohol and sin, basically.

The poll question should be whether God is omnipotent and omniscient or not.

 

[dmar198]

Scenario: You have been placed in a small space craft orbiting Earth. You are all by yourself in this space craft. There are no windows and no way to communicate physically with the world outside the spacecraft.

In this scenario, what effect can your prayers really have?

If God can affect things physically and spiritually, than prayer can affect things physically and spiritually, because it is a participation in the activity of God (if it is answered yes).

 

[Classicist]

God is not a machine or a computer. When we pray in that isolated spaceship, He hears us according to our situation and our knowledge. The only prayer that I could make is for those I’d known on Earth, and for all the inhabitants of the human race.

The proximity of a person to those he is praying for is not a factor. Eternity and infinity are tiny to God.

 

[AlanFromWichita]

This is reminiscent of the Muslim belief (I think) that when they are outside of their homeland,
God doesn’t see them, so they can drink alcohol and sin, basically.

The poll question should be whether God is omnipotent and omniscient or not.

I think it’s more than that. In addition to being omnipotent, the question is whether the action of an isolated person, directly affects others who will receive any physical clue that said prayer was taking place. It isn’t about whether God can hear; it’s about whether God goes into action and performs a “supernatural” act because of the person’s prayer – presumably petition prayer but it wasn’t stated.

Alan

 

[R_C]

So far I am truly pleased with the poll results

Scenario: You have been placed in a small space craft orbiting Earth. You are all by yourself in this space craft. There are no windows and no way to communicate physically with the world outside the spacecraft.

Sounds like a cloistered monastery.

The young St. Teresa de Jesus de Los Andes spoke about the life of a cloistered nun as follows - with words that match the wisdom of great Doctors of the Church and ultimately that are in agreement with Sacred Scripture:

Her redemptive work, is it not similar to that of Christ in the host? She saves souls through prayer and sacrifice. Behind the bars of the cloister, hidden, forgotten by the world, she restrains the justice of God.

It is found almost in the writings of all the saints that even the smallest sacrifice accepted out of love of God and the most trivial act of pure love united to His own works acquires infinite value before His eyes, and that obedient fulfillment of one’s duties according to God’s will can accomplish more than preaching to the whole world.

Did Christ not spend thirty years in an obscure carpenter workshop of a small village, He who at 12 years of age instructed the Doctors of the Law in the Temple of Jerusalem? In doing this, in this hidden life, He gave as much glory to God and saved as many souls as He did in the few years of public preaching and prayer, because He was doing God’s will out of pure love.

Did Our Lady not spend a most hidden life, before, during, and after the Lord’s birth?

Did St. Joseph not follow a similarly hidden life?

Did John the Baptist not spend most of his live in the desert, he who as an unborn was filled with the Holy Spirit by Mary’s voice, and by shacking in the womb filled with the Spirit his own mother Elizabeth?

Not everyone is called to a public life. Some are called to a very private, hidden life. Some are even called to live a cloistered life. All prayer is equally effective in accordance with each and everyone’s state of life.

 

[MSSheBear]

What does location have to do with prayer? I usually can tell when people are praying for me and I go ahead and pray for people. Results aren’t guaranteed because God isn’t a vending machine.

 

[Anthony_V]

Scenario: You have been placed in a small space craft orbiting Earth. You are all by yourself in this space craft. There are no windows and no way to communicate physically with the world outside the spacecraft.

In this scenario, what effect can your prayers really have?

How could the supernatural permeation of prayer even attempt to be studied by the feebleness of human thought? Prayer does not exist in isolation, but within the sphere of God’s grace. Our petitions have no power, except by the love God wishes to communicate through it. In that sense, our prayers cannot be measured in terms of efficacy any more than we can measure the rate at which bucket can fill itself with water.

In any case, the effects of our prayer are not our business unless God wishes for us to see them. We must simply have faith in his faithfulness and act in charity out of love for him. His unfettered love for us and our reciprocal love for him is really the most important aspect of spirituality. “…thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven…”

 

[St_Francis]

I once went through a stressful period. A lady I knew told her friends and they all prayed for me. I did not find out for about three years that they had done this, but I had always been amazed by how much more calmly I handled things during that time than I usually did.

So I know that even if I am stuck in a space capsule that God will use my prayers

 

[LaSainte]

I don’t understand prayer very well. If its against God’s will, then it won’t happen. If it is in line with God’s will, then it will. So…don’t you get the same outcome whether you pray or not, the outcome being God’s will?

 

[AlanFromWichita]

I don’t understand prayer very well. If its against God’s will, then it won’t happen. If it is in line with God’s will, then it will. So…don’t you get the same outcome whether you pray or not, the outcome being God’s will?

An excellent question, which I share regarding petition prayer.

 

[R_C]

I don’t understand prayer very well. If its against God’s will, then it won’t happen. If it is in line with God’s will, then it will. So…don’t you get the same outcome whether you pray or not, the outcome being God’s will?

You don’t understand God very well God is a Father. If you want, say, a hug from your Father, it is certainly in line with his will, but if you don’t ask, you won’t necessarily get it. Same for advice, or help, or anything we can come up with.

God obviously provides for us, but He is neither our servant nor an abstract entity - He is a loving Father with whom we are called to have a true personal relationship.

A love relationship is never from one side alone - it requires that two parties move towards one another and take steps to show love towards one another.

In our case it is somewhat easier, as imperfect creatures, to love the Lord: “we love Him because He loved us first”. Sometimes the bitterness of life can make this hard to grasp - but this is not just true for God…it also applies oftentimes to our parents on earth, to our relatives, to our loved ones…we cannot deny the perfect love bound that connects a father and his children, but often bitterness on one side (or both) can injure the communion and require that one (or both) parties take steps towards reconciliation, and that the other (or both) parties be open to repentance, forgiveness, reparation.

When we take those steps towards God - whom we truly understand solely when we read how Christ spoke and behave, as a truly kind God who loves us to folly - then we always, always find that God responds to us…or rather, when we take those steps is like opening a door and finding that there was already someone knocking outside. This may sound simple-minded at first, but anyone who has experienced a conversion or has at some point had the personal encounter that all believers have with God can confirm this experience.

Prayer then becomes that communication that is essential even between humans for relationships such as between parents and their offspring, brothers and sisters, husband and wife…how much more essential is communication between us and Him, children and Father, spirit and Holy Spirit, soul-bride and Christ-bridegroom…and how much more when the barriers of our limitations and imperfections are wholly lifted if the other party is the Creator, whose specific trait is to be able to listen to each of us individually as if we were the only son…if only we were to trust in Him, we would truly see Him, whether in joy or amidst the harshest sorrows, whether in opulence or in misery.

Truly, if God’s will would always be done without requiring man’s active cooperation and assent, we would live in a heavenly world. But if the image of the crucified Savior teaches us anything, it is that no matter how grand may God’s love be, man must be willing to cooperate, even when this means to do things for others, bear sufferings for others, even sometimes spend our lives for others…and we do not need to look at those who sacrifice their lives literally to save someone, or to those who consecrate their lives to missionary work…sometimes this is as easy as turning our head and looking at an old parent or grandparent who dedicated the largest part of his life to providing for his family, or looking at a clock as we wait for a husband or a wife to come back home from a long day of work.

 

[in_servitude]

The people on this forum have a very different understanding of prayer from those that I interact with on a regular basis. I’ve presented a similar scenario to people who are spiritual enough to have a dialog on the subject, and they wonder how in heck the prayers from a spaceship could have any effect on Earth. Usually, they are quite confused about the subject. Their confusion, in turn, made me confused.

I am of the opinion that we are all connected spiritually. I believe that I can pray for unknown people (unknown to me, anyway) in distant lands, and those prayers - through the power of God, of course - can have a tangible affect on those unknown people.

So, I wanted to come here and see how others felt about this subject. If the poll results showed that people didn’t expect prayers to have an effect, then I would probably wonder when I had lost my mind.

I very much appreciate your comments. Thanks!!

 

[AlanFromWichita]

I was the one vote for it will affect the one praying and nobody else. Well, I think from a spiritual standpoint, my personal opinion is that prayer does not automatically get translated into supernatural forces. But I may be wrong.

A scientific argument could be made on the basis of quantum physics, that the “wavicles” or whatever it is that makes up the “stuff” of the people and things in the world, have demonstrated behavior that appears that they can be one or many places at the same time, and they can be one or many in number on a statistical basis. Mathematically, we can find a probability that at any given time you look, all electrons are actually one electron – at other times they are all separate. This is weird enough to believe that even in the measurable world, something going on in the mind of a person in a spaceship, could influence things and events that appear to be totally isolated. The issue is that they only appear to be isolated to our simplistic view – that metal is actually solid and impervious to any sorts of communications whatsoever. Those communications we can participate in with our five senses, and carry out with our current technology.

With all that, I can readily accept a proposition that spiritual realities are such that there is such communication just as there are quantum relationships between all parts of the known universe and electrons, which at our zoom level largely define the behavior of the materials of which we are made.

So you’d think I’d have voted for “others will be affected in a number of ways.”

Mainly it was the wording of the question, “The person praying may experience an effect, but that’s it.”

I have just proven to myself that without even having to consult mystical theology, quantum physics shows us that everyone and everything is affected in a number of ways by every act, including prayer. We are all one big reality happening, and no part can be wholly described except in the context of all the other parts.

But the word “experience” bothered me. I took this to mean a conscious experience. If you meant “experience” in the fact that they will be affected but in ways that may have nothing to do with the content of the prayer, I might be able to switch my intended vote. But if you mean “experience” as in others will consciously feel a sense of peace or serenity or strength or some other good thing – that they would not have if the prayer hadn’t been said – then I’m going to stick to my vote pending more pondering.

Alan

 

[Holly3278]

God is not limited by space and time. How could He be when He created space and time? And so, prayer does have an effect. It could have many effects.

 

[in_servitude]

But the word “experience” bothered me. I took this to mean a conscious experience. If you meant “experience” in the fact that they will be affected but in ways that may have nothing to do with the content of the prayer, I might be able to switch my intended vote. But if you mean “experience” as in others will consciously feel a sense of peace or serenity or strength or some other good thing – that they would not have if the prayer hadn’t been said – then I’m going to stick to my vote pending more pondering.

By experience - I mean something mental, physical, or spiritual.

For example, lets say that I pray for less suffering in Africa. I’m not in Africa, and if I know someone there, I wouldn’t know who it would be. I have no idea how God would choose to respond to my prayer. God could choose to modify the weather, or soften someone’s heart, or grant them a spiritual gift.

I’m quite ignorant of God in that I have no idea why He works they way He does. For whatever reason, it seems He answers our prayers (in some way - not the way we think is best).

What I hear most often around where I live is that God does NOT answer our prayers. Rather, our prayers affect us internally - and then that internal change causes us to behave differently - then results in changed interactions with others - which then causes internal changes in those people. Thus, God is nearly taken out of the equation altogether. I believe that the “God-tricks-us-into-changing-things-ourselves” theology is nearly completely spiritually dead.

 

[R_C]

By experience - I mean something mental, physical, or spiritual.

For example, lets say that I pray for less suffering in Africa. I’m not in Africa, and if I know someone there, I wouldn’t know who it would be. I have no idea how God would choose to respond to my prayer. God could choose to modify the weather, or soften someone’s heart, or grant them a spiritual gift.

I’m quite ignorant of God in that I have no idea why He works they way He does. For whatever reason, it seems He answers our prayers (in some way - not the way we think is best).

What I hear most often around where I live is that God does NOT answer our prayers. Rather, our prayers affect us internally - and then that internal change causes us to behave differently - then results in changed interactions with others - which then causes internal changes in those people. Thus, God is nearly taken out of the equation altogether. I believe that the “God-tricks-us-into-changing-things-ourselves” theology is nearly completely spiritually dead.

If God does not answer our prayers, then Christ is a liar and Scripture is nonsense. It’s that simple.