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[teeban]

Prayer as medical treatment has been studied, and prayer by the patient, like meditation or positive thoughts in general, do help, of course. Praying on other people who don't know about it, though, has been unequivocally proven not to help. Yet, people won't friggin' stop that annoying habit. "I'll pray that your mother-in-law's ex-cousin-in-law's boyfriend's balls don't have cancer!" Gag me.

Anyhoo, I'm all for this provision. Some of these fringe groups have major money (this would cater to Scientologists as well, no?) and if something like this gets them on board, well then, hooray for the idiocracy.

[profxfiles]

This would be so fun--I want to get Satanic prayer treatments for my back problems!

[notaprof]

Can someone explain to me why a prayer treatment has any cost associated with it whatsoever?

Are people really paid to pray?

I wondered about this too.  Whatever you believe about the power of prayer, I think any prayers you had to pay for would negate their healing value.  I have lots of questions about this.  Pray or pay option?  Sounds like the paid indulgences of the Middle Ages with the professional pardoners who would forgive your sins if you paid the right price.  I see prayer healing as an attractive opening for organized crime to get their foot into the door in health care - the prayer mafia!  What happens if you don't pray up?  How will the collections agencies work?  Is there malpractice insurance for prayer healers?  How were the effects of prayer on healing measured?  Did they have a control group who only received placebo prayers?

[dolljepopp]

I am willing to pray for anyone for any purpose to any deity or deities.



Fees negotiable...

[navydad]

Of course, now we will have to set up Prayer Panels.

First let's conduct rigorous, double blind outcome studies to assess the efficacy of various forms of prayer (FOPs) and their relationship to various Purported Objects Of Prayer (POOPs). I'm going to go out on a limb here and predict that such studies will reveal no reliable, statistically significant differences among various FOPs and POOPs. Therefore the main criteria upon which Prayer Panels can base reimbursement decisions will be cost. Therefore I am submitting a patent application for Dianetically inspired prayer wheels, loosely based on Tibetan prayer wheels. Talk about cost effective! You just set the things up in a windy place (sorry, the technology is proprietary) and let them go. Small up front costs, small maintenance costs, energy efficient, and best of all, almost no personnel costs.

[ghillbilly]

If my tax dollars are paying for it, then no religious anything should be covered. No different than the public school system.