Intercessory Prayer is when you pray to God that something you want will happen
or that something you don't want will not happen. In these cases, you are asking
God to "intercede" on your behalf. It has been a part of most religions for ages
and ages. But, does it work?
Well, a few years ago a study ( Study of the Therapeutic Effects of Intercessory
Prayer (STEP) in cardiac bypass patients: a multicenter randomized trial of
uncertainty and certainty of receiving intercessory prayer. Am Heart J.2006
Apr;151(4):934-42) was completed by a group of researchers (Benson H, Dusek JA,
Sherwood JB, Lam P, Bethea CF, Carpenter W, Levitsky S, Hill PC, Clem DW JR,
Jain MK, Drumel D, Kopecky SL, Mueller PS, Marek D, Rollins S, Hibberd PL.) The
study tested the effect of prayer on the rate of complications following
coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery.
Three groups of patients were included in the study: those who were told they
would definitely receive intercessory prayer to assist in their recovery (601
patients,) those who were told they may or may not receive intercessory prayer
and did (601 patients,) and those who were told they may or may not receive it
but did NOT (597 patients.) Quoting from the abstract: RESULTS: In the 2 groups
uncertain about receiving intercessory prayer, complications occurred in 52%
(315/604) of patients who received intercessory prayer versus 51% (304/597) of
those who did not (relative risk 1.02, 95% CI 0.92-1.15). Complications occurred
in 59% (352/601) of patients certain of receiving intercessory prayer compared
with the 52% (315/604) of those uncertain of receiving intercessory prayer
(relative risk 1.14, 95% CI 1.02-1.28). Major events and 30-day mortality were
similar across the 3 groups. CONCLUSIONS: Intercessory prayer itself had no
effect on complication-free recovery from CABG, but certainty of receiving
intercessory prayer was associated with a higher incidence of complications.
What are we to make of that? Is it possible that prayer could cause greater
complications to occur? One might argue that if the patients knew they were
being prayed for, they might have taken more risks or might have tried less hard
on their own to get well. But we are talking about post-operative complications,
not lifestyle changes. The operative factors here are short-term events
immediately surrounding the surgery, not ongoing lifestyle factors with long,
sustained ramifications.
Reportedly this study was carried out with excellent scientific design, very
carefully laid out. But in their scientific certainty, the researchers failed to
consider factors that make reality work. In the words of a recent acquaintance
"they used bad theology." In principle I agree with this, but I would word it
differently. In my view the biggest factor these researchers overlooked was that
of humility. Yes, that's right: HUMILITY.
Where did I come up with that idea? Bear with me here - this gets a bit
complicated. Long ago a friend introduced me to the discipline of Reiki. If you
are not familiar with this, Reiki is a form of energy that assists the body's
ability to heal itself. At least that is the official, introductory explanation.
Oh, but it is so much more than that!
According to the official introductory explanation, a person who has been
attuned to Level One Reiki can simply lay their hands on someone and thus
transfer some energy that will assist in healing say an injury or a part of the
receiver's body that has pain. Though the mechanism of action is not clear to me
even to this day, the initial concept was simple enough. I was very skeptical,
but the same day I first heard about it, I allowed my friend to give me the
"attunement" that transferred this healing energy to my hands. In subsequent
months I used it from time to time for minor aches and pains, almost in the same
vein as that in which Bensen and Dusek's team carried out their study on prayer:
"to see if it worked!"
While clearly it was not magic and could not do the impossible, before long,
this practice of Reiki had earned enough respect in my experience that I knew it
was time to increase my skills to the next level. In Level Two Reiki I had
heard, it was possible, not only to transfer the healing energy in a hands-on
manner, but also to send it to an intention. In fact it was even possible to
send it over distances to help heal someone too far away to physically touch. I
approached the three day training session with some amount of trepidation. I was
excited but worried: "was I being swept into something too 'out there' for my
generally 'here and now' self?"
Sitting through the training session, one concept leapt out at me as very
important. "Reiki must always be used for the "greater good." You cannot use it
to manipulate people." For example, you could not send Reiki to the intention
that your worst enemy will break his leg. Not that I was planning to manipulate
or harm anyone, but this was intriguing to me. What was this "greater good" the
teacher talked about? Who exactly would be determining the greater good in any
given situation??? While I immediately grasped the idea that one could not
control a person or a situation with Reiki, it was some time before I grasped
the depth of the concept of the "greater good."
Not long after the training session, I was describing my new Level Two Reiki
skills to a friend - a non-religious friend, who I thought would be similarly
skeptical - when to my shock she blurted out "Oh, so it's like prayer then!" At
first I was insulted and taken aback by this. My view of prayer at the time was
like asking for magic. I was not prone to praying for personal favors from an
anthropomorphic God I did not believe in - and I was proud of it.
Nonetheless I continued to use the Reiki and over time my understanding of it
continued to deepen. Slowly I came to see that part of what was meant by that
"greater good" involved having the HUMILITY to know that what I want to happen
in any given situation may not be the best thing overall. With this wonderful
tool in my hands - allowing me to send healing energy to all sorts of
conflicting situations and to people with various illnesses - how could I, in my
limited humanness, know all the factors? In any given situation, whatever
intention I sent to, I would have to allow that I did not in fact know what
outcome would be best. I had no right to specify and ask that MY WILL be done -
I could only send energy to the "greater good" and trust the Reiki, or whoever
was supplying it, to "know" the difference.
Here is a perfect example that was going on just at the time I was coming to
full realization of this. One of my brothers was having trouble in his marriage.
I decided to send Reiki to his relationship with his wife. Understanding the
"greater good" concept required that I have the HUMILITY to know that, much as I
had a strong hope for the relationship in question to flourish, my sending Reiki
could have the effect of assisting it to end. My sending Reiki meant giving up
my investment in the outcome and trusting that my efforts would assist the
"greater good" to occur - even if that meant I would be furthering the
non-preferred outcome. If it was time for their relationship to end, my Reiki
could help that happen faster, possibly with less grief and ill will, but end
just the same. It was quite a task for me to accept this. Much as I liked my
sister in law, and much as I did not want my brother divorced, I had to accept
that my place was simply to send "to the greater good in their relationship."
...and NOT to the intention of trying to save their marriage!
Over the years, there were many opportunities to help people by sending Reiki.
Some got better, some died. Some grew, some got divorced. The opportunity for
humility came from knowing it was not I who was in control of the process,
whether you want to call it prayer, Reiki or wishful thinking. I had to learn to
develop the humility to see that the greater good (whoever or whatever sort of
being was determining just what that greater good was) was something beyond my
knowledge and beyond my understanding.
So if Reiki is similar to prayer, and yes, now all these years later, I can say
I see how it is - it is not so important to whom exactly you pray. If there is a
god up there with any goodness or perspective, he would accept your prayer, your
chanting or your Reiki sending, no matter who or what you think you are sending
it to. Only a man-made, small minded god would only listen to prayers sent
specifically to a limited concept of him in a particular manner from a certain
group of his people, supposedly favored by him above all the rest!
Mystics say they pray, not so much for personal favors, but to align themselves
with the will of God. In most cases, the God they are referring to is not the
specific, humanoid, bearded guy in the sky of organized religion - but something
broader than that, less defined, something like Goodness, Truth, or Love.
Praying to "align oneself with" the God of the Mystics it would seem really is
almost the same thing as sending Reiki to the "greater good!"
Before they design another study testing the powers of prayer, Drs Benson, Dusek
and team would do well to understand the "greater good" concept. They need to
have the humility to see that they cannot possibly know what the greater good is
in any situation. They especially need to know that the greater good, God's
will, or whatever else you want to call it, is surely more complex than the
assumption that each patient should have the least cardiac complications. Maybe
the greater good in the case of some of those cardiac patients was that they
learn something from the experience of the complications! Maybe they needed to
learn endurance! Maybe the prayer helped the doctors learn something new about
how to manage the complications. Maybe the prayers offered in the study DID
assist in the greater good. But the study itself did not measure the efficacy of
intercessory prayer. It studied only the need for men to assume they know more
than they do.
And when we are trying to determine whether or not intercessory prayer "works,"
we need to have the HUMILITY to realize that OUR idea of judging it may not be
in keeping with the "greater good." Our prayers may be working toward an end we
have no way of knowing about - a "greater good" that respects a reality broader
and more encompassing than that which we are able to perceive.
"...NOT MY WILL, BUT "THINE" BE DONE!"
....Look for my soon to be posted article on the correlation of the "greater
good" concept with the upcoming election!

Become A Powerful Reiki Master In Just 48 Hours...:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/reikijenf/