Prayer and Spirituality Health Article

Definition

Prayer is an act of communication with God or the Absolute. The spiritual beliefs of the person praying influence how the Absolute is perceived. For some, the Absolute is known as the Great Goddess. Others experience the Absolute as God, Allah, the Tao, the Universal Mind, Brahma, the Void, or a myriad of other forms. Spiritual, or faith, healing is the relief of illness through some type of religious belief system held by the sick person or by someone praying for them.

Origins

Prayer in one form or another is a spiritual practice found in nearly every culture. The use of prayer for healing is a vital principle of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. Even in a non-theistic religion such as Buddhism, prayer is important in healing. In the traditional medicine of Mexico, curanderismo, health is perceived as a gift from God. Disease is seen as a punishment for sins and God's help is necessary for a cure. Patients may pray or make a spiritual pilgrimage as part of their medical treatment.

Spiritual healing in the West dates back to Biblical times, when some of the Hebrew prophets and Jesus used the power of prayer to heal the sick and injured. In the Jewish and Christian religions, praying for healing and medical miracles has been common for 3,000 years. The Christian tradition of faith healing formally developed out of a first-century prayer ritual for healing. Among contemporary Christians belonging to liturgical churches (Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Episcopalians, and Lutherans), spiritual healing is related to the sacraments of the Eucharist and anointing the sick, especially in churches, shrines, or sites where miracles have taken place. In the United States, numerous spiritual healing or faith healing groups and movements have appeared since the early 1800s, such as the Emmanuel movement and the John Alexander Dowie movement.

Christian Science, a movement that grew out of the Association formed by Mary Baker Eddy in 1876, holds faith healing at the core of its principles. Christian Scientists believe that death and illness are illusions. Eddy claimed that the end result of knowledge gained through Christian Science is the power to heal. Eddy's beliefs stemmed from her claims that she was cured of various illnesses in 1862 through massage, positive reinforcement, and mental healing. In 1875, she published Science and Health, the founding text of Christian Science.

People have always prayed, especially when sick or facing death. Still, despite the scientific evidence pointing to the effectiveness of prayer, it is not generally accepted as a treatment method by the Western medical community. Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, believed that the mind and body were separate, and this point of view is the foundation of modern Western medicine.

Beginning in the seventeenth century, with the philosophy of René Descartes, the West has increasingly focused on a material view of the world. In medicine this has meant that an almost exclusive concentration on the physical aspects of disease. The contribution of emotions, thoughts, relationships, and spirituality to disease and health were either ignored or discounted. Only since the 1960s has there been an increase in interest about the effectiveness of prayer, meditation, and other mind-body approaches to health and healing.

Benefits

Perhaps the two most obvious benefits of faith healing is that the cost is minimal or zero, and that it involves no medications or medical devices. The medical, scientific, and religious communities almost unanimously agree that the human mind has a tremendous amount of untapped potential, including the power to heal physical and emotional ailments. A person's faith has a strong influence over his or her sense of well-being, ability to fight disease, and desire to get well, according to many researchers.

Prayer and other spiritual approaches can be particularly beneficial for people with stress-related disorders. Dr. Herbert Benson reports that meditative prayer can ease anxiety, mild depression, substance abuse, ulcers, pain, nausea, tension and migraine headaches, infertility, premenstrual syndrome (PMS), insomnia, and high blood pressure.

Prayer also plays an important role in helping people cope with difficult circumstances such as chronic illness and death. Prayer offers new meaning, purpose, hope, and a sense of guidance or control. These perceptions may help instill a fighting spirit, which has been reported to be an important factor in healing. Prayer can enrich the quality of one's life and also bring a feeling of peace and acceptance at the time of death. In addition, being part of a religious community can benefit patients by counteracting the social isolation that many sick people experience. Visits from friends or their spiritual leader are reminders that they are still part of a faith community and the larger human community.

More recently, researchers have recognized that prayer and spiritual practice are often related to people's connections with other creatures. Although the strength of the bond between humans and animals was first discussed in the context of people's grieving for dead pets,

the human-animal connection and its role in spirituality is now being studied in its own right.