Day 283 - Is prayer fair?

 

I wonder how fair prayer is.

If you think about it, it is a kind of popularity contest in some ways. If you are a leader of a country or a celebrity, then you are likely to get a lot of prayers. But if you are relatively unknown, then there is not going to be much prayer support is there? So a famous preacher, who is ill, is likely to get a lot more prayer than… say someone like my brother, who was not famous.

During the latter part of the brain-cancer, I tried to organise some prayer support. This was when I believed that prayer was a lot more efficacious than I do now. Ad was always very open to people praying for him. He wasn’t one of those people who found the whole idea offensive and a kind of secret invasion of privacy or human rights. However, he was also very honest in any feedback. “It’s not working,” he would often say.

Alongside looking for medical trials, I tried to organise a prayer campaign and got my brother on church prayer lists and a friend even kindly organised a Mass to be said for him. I even emailed the faith healers, but I wanted to spare Ad the worst of that because so many faith healers are unaccountable and their success record is not always as great as they claim it to be. Some of them are simply dodgy.

And, of course, before I stopped praying – I prayed for him.

If prayer is dependent on the number of prayers you get, then is it any wonder that our kings, queens, politicians, celebrities often thrive and live life to the full? But if you are relatively isolated, or if you do not know many believers, then who is going to pray for you? It isn’t fair if the efficacy of prayers is based on the number of people praying them. Hopefully, you would think that the Almighty might take this into account. But who knows?

Prayer is supposed to heal. We have some very exciting stories in faith circles about doctors saying things like: “We’ve never seen anything like it, the tumour just disappeared! We can’t explain it.”

However, in my brother’s case, the words said by the doctors were: “We’ve never seen anything like it, the tumour has grown back faster than we have ever seen!”

It was a kind of miracle in reverse. An elcarim.

And I am so sick of miracles in reverse.

My belief in prayer remains, I suppose. After all, I wouldn’t be on a prayer-strike if I did not believe that prayer, in some way or form, did not do things which we cannot always understand. However, if the flaky church signs are to be believed: ‘Seven days without prayer makes one weak.’ Then I really must be in a bad spiritual state mustn’t I? And I’m not the only one.

I think prayer is a good deed. I’m sure it is more complicated than that, but it is not the most enjoyable thing in the world is it?

On and on they go about how God does not need our prayers. So, why all the manipulations to pray then?

The gods do not need our worship, they have their nectar and ambrosia, so what is the problem?

Prayer is not fair.