Prayer and Healing by William B. Lindley I was raised in Christian Science. That gives me somewhat of an inside perspective on prayer and healing. However, the Christian Science experience is far from typical. The "Scientific Statement of Being" begins: "There is no life, truth, intelligence nor substance in matter." Most Christians who offer prayers of petition for the healing of an illness believe that their bodies are real and the illness is real, but they want supernatural intervention, the sort of thing Jesus is reported to have done in the gospels. Christian Science, interpreting Jesus' work quite differently, insists that reality lies elsewhere. The analogue to prayer is "knowing the truth." Christian Science insists that miracles are not "supernatural, but divinely natural." As I grew up and matter made more sense to me, I drifted away from Christian Science. Then I began hearing about natural, non-miraculous analogues to what I had been taught: psychosomatic diseases and cures, the placebo effect, and, more recently, the neurochemical connections between mood and the immune system. These, along with "spontaneous remission" of cancers, were attempts to explain "miracles" without invoking the supernatural or the paranormal. (Note that "spontaneous" (natural), and "God did it" (supernatural), are "explanations" that explain nothing. There's no "how.") Believers in miracles - evangelicals, Christian Scientists, miscellaneous New Agers, and so forth - continue as before. Healing Words by Larry Dossey, M.D. is a book devoted to prayer and healing, and its author believes firmly that prayer (communication with "the Absolute") brings about beneficial effects that are real and substantial and supernatural or paranormal in character. However, when he raises the question, "What is prayer?", the answer is so far-ranging that all sorts of things that would not ordinarily be considered prayer are included. He rejects the Christian concept of prayer! Of course he doesn't use such strong language as "reject," preferring slippery words like "redefine," "tentative" and "reevaluate." He has a chart on p. 8, contrasting the "traditional Western model" with the "modern" model of prayer. Probably over 95% of the prayers for healing that are made in the United States would be of the "old" model, which Dossey considers obsolete. Interestingly enough, Christian Science prayer would fall under the 5% that he would approve of. Even though Dossey seems to think little of traditional prayer, his citations of many experiments that allegedly demonstrate the efficacy of prayer do not indicate whether the style of prayer was traditional or otherwise. (He clearly expresses his opinion that all kinds work, some better than others.) The experiments are broken down into various categories of what was prayed over - barley seeds(!), mice, people, etc. - but not into categories of what kind of prayer was made. Sometimes Dossey seems to be unaware of the implications of what he says. For example, he quotes psychologist Lawrence LeShan to the effect that healing through prayer is effective in perhaps 15 to 20 percent of cases and that nobody can tell in advance which cases will have happy outcomes. Somewhat disheartened by this, Dossey goes on to claim that prayer works anyway. Then he mentions the "bizarre," "perverted" use of prayer by high school football teams in Texas, where, of course, they offer up highly unsportsmanlike prayers for victory. Such prayers obviously "work" 50% of the time. (We might cut this to 48% or so for tie games.) Thus one can conclude that prayer for victory in football is three times as efficacious as prayer for healing! Dossey wisely reminds us that if all prayers for healing led to success, population growth would be even more catastrophic than it is; 100% success rates for other kinds of prayer could have other horrible long-term effects. (Billy Graham put it a little differently: "God answers all prayers; sometimes the answer is 'no'.") However, once this is admitted - and note that it flatly contradicts Jesus' promise in Matthew 7:7,8: "Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened." - the result is indistinguishable from that of no prayer at all. Another problem is the intent of the person praying. Others who have faced the incoherent attempts to define prayer have said that the essence of prayer, whether there be a Supreme Being or not, is that the person praying must intend, or want, or be praying for, a particular happy ending to the current crisis. However, Dossey rejects the concept of intent. He states: "For reasons I shall discuss later, never once did I pray for specific outcomes - for cancers to go away, for heart attacks to be healed, for diabetes to vanish." He reports on an interesting group, Spindrift, that provides many "proofs" that prayer works. This group had a number of Christian Scientists in it. (One was a Christian Science practitioner whose "license" was revoked after The First Church of Christ, Scientist found out what he was up to.) Spindrift took up the question of directed vs. undirected prayer, and found that the undirected prayer worked somewhat better. Most of the other experiments by other groups, for example, with barley seeds, were directed - the intent to have the seeds flourish was in the minds of the people who prayed over them. Let's take a closer look at those experiments. There is a long list of them. The compiler is Daniel J. Benor, M.D. He published his survey in the journal Complementary Medical Research in 1990. The activity is called "spiritual healing," and this is defined as "the intentional influence of one or more people upon another living system without utilizing known physical means of intervention." (Note how this differs from the Spindrift effort cited above and from Dossey's preference for nondirected prayer.) Of 131 trials, five involved water, with three showing "significant results," but what was being prayed for in the water cases is not mentioned. There were ten trials of "enzymes," including trypsin, dopamine, and noradrenaline. (Are these enzymes? I think not.) There were seven trials on fungi and yeasts, with some prayers being for, some against, the prosperous growth of the culture. Similarly for the ten trials on bacteria, mainly E. Coli and Salmonella. Cells in vitro (tube or glass dish) were prayed over, including four trials on snail pacemaker cells. There were 19 trials on plants and seeds, including five on the above-mentioned barley seeds. Three of these involved different kinds of person praying: one with neurotic depression, one with psychotic depression, and one with a green thumb. As you might guess, the last showed the strongest beneficial effect. Other plants and seeds prayed over include: rye grass, wheat seeds, radish seeds, mung beans, potatoes and corn. The prayer trials on animals include 14 on anesthetized mice, with a variety of experimental conditions and effects sought. Humans were also prayed over for a total of 38 of the 131 trials. Some of the conditions prayed over are obviously psychosomatic, some less so. Clearly there is an enthusiastic "spiritual healing research" community doing many things we wouldn't ordinarily think of. Something I was unable to find in all this is any breakdown by religion of the person praying. Christians would consider it vital to ask whether the words "In Jesus' name we pray, amen" were spoken. If they weren't, the Christians would be extremely skeptical of the efficacy of the prayers. If they were confronted by overwhelming evidence that a non-Christian prayer was highly effective, they would suspect Satanism and look for evidence of it. Similarly perhaps for Muslims. Catholics might accept evidence of efficacy of prayers invoking the Trinity while being skeptical of those with Protestant prayer tags. Regrettably, the 131 trials provide us with no information along these lines. Another missing factor that I regret - at least, it is not available to me as I write this - is a detailed skeptical review of the experimental methodology of some of the more impressive trials. The Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal seems to be silent in this area. While they have offered some criticism of Therapeutic Touch, they seem to be silent on the question of religious prayer healing, except in "revivals," where some noteworthy frauds have been exposed. This is part of a pattern. Most of the subjects discussed in the Skeptical Inquirer are New Age phenomena, such as crop circles, UFOs, pyramid power, astrology, and so on. CSICOP seems to be leaving Christianity alone, at least for the time being. Dossey's book cries for skeptical attention. As in the other cases, such attention would have to be very painstaking, time-consuming, and expensive. Meanwhile, prayers for healing continue, some effectively utilizing known psychosomatic processes, others producing remarkable placebo effects (the same thing, except that we don't know what's happening), and many more where supernatural claims are made, as well as those disappointing cases where God seems to have said "no." Postscript: This article has been mostly a partial review of Larry Dossey's book. In preparing it, I have become more familiar with his thought. It is interesting to see how paths cross. In our last issue, I reviewed Evolution's End by Joseph Chilton Pearce. In that review I called attention to the author's high regard for Larry Dossey. Remarkable Recovery, reviewed elsewhere in this issue, has a foreword with praise by - Larry Dossey. (To their credit in my opinion, the authors of Remarkable Recovery seem to be less in love with the supernatural than Dossey.) In the next issue, we plan to include a book review of The Self-Aware Universe by Amit Goswami. It has a back-cover blurb with praise from Larry Dossey. Small world. Healing Words: The Power of Prayer and The Practice of Medicine by Larry Dossey, M.D. Copyright ©1993. Published by HarperSan Francisco, Division of HarperCollins Publishers, 10 East 53rd St., New York, NY 10022. ISBN: 0-06-250251-4, 276pp, hardback. Table of Contents | 1995 Issues | Subscribe Truth Seeker | Feedback | Freethought.com Webmaster Credit card Orders call: 800-321-9054 or fax: (619)676-0433 Or send check or money order to: Truth Seeker / 16935 W. Bernardo Drive, Suite 103 / San Diego, CA 92127 $20.00 annual U.S. subscription ($35.00 international). Individual issues—$10.00 + $2.50 postage and handling Or be a committed freethinker and send $35.00 for a two year subscription. Truth Seeker is published by Truth Seeker Co., Inc. (ISSN 0041-3712) © 1996