Powerless Prayer

I can't count the number of times I have heard people say they will "pray for his o her recovery" when a person is seriously ill. But does praying for someone who is sick really help them recover? That's a question a group researchers tried to determine recently in a study that charted the progress of 1,800 heart patients at six medical centers. The study did not deal with personal prayer, only with the idea that someone else is prayer for the sick individual. I find this an interesting study, more for sociological reasons than medical.
We have all thought to ourselves when someone has said he or she will pray for another " But I wonder if anyone is listening". Well, this study did not question the existence of God, whether God listens to and answers prayers or anything else beyond the effects of the prayers on the person's health. Three Christian groups prayed for some of the 1,800 and not for others, starting the night before their heart surgery and with each prayer asking for "a successful surgery with a quick, healthy recovery and no complications".
The patients were split into three groups of 600 each: those who knew they were being prayed for, those who were prayed for but only knew it was a possibility, and those who weren't prayed for but were told it was a possibility. And the results? With 30 days of surgery the researchers found no effect of prayer on recovery. But among patients who did receive prayers, a slightly higher percent actually got worse (Please don't pray for me....) and had complications than those patients who were not prayed for.
In essence, the study found no effect of prayer on a person's health. But I think one thing not touched on by the study is that telling someone you will pray for them (even if, like many people, they never carry through on that promise) does seem to make the ill person feel more comfortable, both spiritually and physically. There is comfort in in hearing those words, and that tends to translate into a less anxious or depressed state of mind in the ill. That in itself makes "Ill pray for you" a nice phrase to hear. (If you pray hard enough I will soon end this . Hehe )
One person we should pray for is Anthony Mesa, 21, of Delton . Florida. Or rather, we should pray for his sanity to return. You see, Anthony is in big trouble and facing jail time after pleading no contest to charges that he urinated in a bottle of soda pop that ..uh... from which one of the customers at Anthony's convenience store, had been drinking. The customer had left the store briefly, only to return to it and resume drinking his bi bottle of urine...I mean, soft drink. Subsequently, the customer became violently ill and police arrested Loose Bladder Anthony on charges of tampering with the customer's property with evil intent.
Anthony will be sentenced later but could probably use your prayers for Anthony to develop a healthier bladder and greater restraint.