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Do People Really Believe in Prayer?
Like many people, I have been moved by the prayer and expressions of love and compassion regarding the tragic football incident involving Damar Hamlin:
After a routine tackle during Monday night’s Bills-Bengals game, Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin collapsed on his back in cardiac arrest. Medical personnel administered CPR for roughly 10 minutes before an ambulance carted Hamlin off the field and to a Cincinnati hospital. While it drove off, onlookers reported seeing Bills head coach Sean McDermott gather his players on the field for communal prayer. As both teams and staff knelt around Hamlin during those 10 minutes of CPR, individual players certainly were praying too. One Bengals fan at the game scribbled ‘Pray for Buffalo #3 Hamlin’ on a paper sign. Minutes later, fans of both teams showed up at Hamlin’s hospital to pray. Players from around the league, fans, and others across social media offered prayers. We join them all in their prayers for his body and soul.
When tragedy occurs in this country, we often see communities rallying to pray for the victims. Prayer vigils are held, flowers are offered, and candles are lit as a way to demonstrate hope for positive outcomes. I’ve also been glad to hear from many in the media who have praised these displays for Damar Hamlin, who was not only a very good football player but also an honorable individual, who is close to his family and has formed a charitable foundation.
So why am I disconsolate?
* * * *
At first, I was gratified to see so many demonstrations of support across the country, especially when I saw so many people engaged in them. I even went so far as speculating that maybe the response was so massive because there was more going on than I saw on the surface. Could people in this country, a country that has ridiculed and rejected anything resembling religion in general in the last several years, actually be realizing that prayers can make a difference? Was it possible that, aside from being reminded of their own mortality, they were beginning to believe that there was a role for prayer and maybe even religion in this country?
Probably not.
I began to realize that I am so desperate to live in a country that values religion and its tenets, its morality and blessings, that I will look for signs anywhere and everywhere to confirm my desires. That people coming together in community gatherings may be motivated by their own sense of isolation and that any opportunity to congregate provides relief from their loneliness. That many people would ironically claim that their prayers have little if anything to do with G-d or religion, but more to do with a “universal concern” for the healing of Damar Hamlin.
That rather than our experiencing a cultural transformation, we are witnessing a temporary, if satisfying, display of concern and wishes for good outcomes. Besides, the prayers can’t hurt.
* * * *
And yet. And yet.
I can’t give up my hope that maybe, just maybe, a tiny seed has been planted. That people will realize that prayer is not only powerful, but prayer on behalf of others can be transformative. That each person who has joined with others, lit a candle, and brought flowers will realize that these acts of compassion are part of a bigger plan in the cosmos, often beyond understanding but soul-filling, nonetheless.
So I simply can’t give up hope for the spiritual future of our country.
My prayers go out for the recovery of Damar Hamlin, for his family, as well as the healing of our nation.
Published in Culture
FYI, there are people who don’t believe in a personal G-d the Creator but believe in a universal G-d. In Buddhism, He is considered part of the absolute (as opposed to the relative). Sylvia Boorstein was a Jew/Bu and wrote a great book, That’s Funny, You Don’t Look Buddhist. I don’t agree with her blending the practices, but she does a good job of explaining how she “holds” both Judaism and Buddhism. It’s been a while, but I’ll bet she prays.
I did see a clip of one guy on ESPN who offered a very sincere, heartfelt prayer during a broadcast. Almost made me change my opinion of ESPN.
edit: See Susan’s comment at #27; she offers a link to the event.
True! They had some really awful broadcasters at one point–the worst of the woke!
The answer isn’t whether or not people are virtue signaling or not. Nobody gets virtue points at such times. The real answer is whether or not the person feeling grief gets a measure of relief thanks to the concern of others and/or the genuine belief God will hear so many prayers..
If a person is only virtue signaling rather than praying sincerely, that is between him and G-d. Meanwhile, as you say, RH, those who know the prayers are being offered are likely comforted.
😂😂😂
As a non-believer, I neither pray nor believe in the power of prayer. But if someone says he is praying for me, I say thank you, because it’s a very kind gesture and certainly can’t hurt.
The Lord bless you and yours. Adoption is to be celebrated.
Thanks for this post, Susan. Yes, I think people in the U.S. believe in the power of prayer. The various demographic studies I´ve seen all put the share of the population that identifies as Christian in the mid- to upper-70%s range. Add to that the share of religious Jews, Hindus, Moslems, Buddhists, and therapeutic Deists along with those who have ascribe to some form of “spirituality without religion” and I am sure the share of the population that prays or meditates and believes in the efficacy of prayer is likely quite high.
Yep. They were 2 1/2, 3 1/2, and 4 1/2 when we got them. Hard to believe they’re now 28, 29, and 30 . . .
Would like to hear more about the early years when you transitioned to full fatherhood with 3 young ones suddenly. Next meetup.
I believe G-d factors in your prayers to His Divine Providence. It may not change the outcome. His plan is inscrutable to us. (I picked up that phrasing from our recently departed Pope Benedict XVI.) At a minimum prayer for someone does two things, even if it doesn’t alter G-d’s plans. By the way, I don’t believe G-d alters His plans; He already knows the prayers that will be coming, so He has factored that in. But “altering His plans” is just a way of phrasing it. So two things: (1) It unites your heart to G-d, and that is a grace, whether you realize it or not. (2) It unites your heart to the love of your neighbor, after all you’re praying for him, and in Jewish terms, if I may, that’s a mitzvah, a meritorious and charitable act in G-d’s eyes. Pray for people always.
Lovely sentiments, Manny. Thank you. I think our prayers do indeed connect us to G-d and our “neighbors.”
Mine was from close by to Russia, Kazakhstan. He was a year and a day old when officially final adoption. He’s 13 now.
Being somewhere on the agnostic / skeptic spectrum I usually stay out of this, but I gotta ask: What the heck is a therapeutic Deist?
Ours is from Austin…domestic adoption worked for us after two failed adoptions from Colombia.
We had a failed from Vietnam before we got Kazakhstan.
The full term most often used is “Moral Therapeutic Deist”, and the school of thought “Moral Therapeutic Deism”. I think it was coined by Christian Smith and one of his co-authors about 20 years ago, plus/minus. The term refers to someone who wants the therapeutic benefits, self-affirming aspects of a very watered-down version of Judeo-Christianity without the supernatural elements, and often “preaches” a version of Jesus and Moses reduced to simply ethical teachers. Essentially it turns Jesus or Moses into a mascot who confirms the modern leftist´s already-held “tolerant and inclusive” views on ethics and morality in every aspect of life.
Nota bene: The outpouring of prayer for Damar Hamlin from …white Evangelicals and Catholics (mirabile dictu)…is yet another pepple in the ever-growing mountain of evidence that America is not systemically racist. Racists don´t pray for people of an “inferior” race.
I just heard that Damar is conscious! When he was told about the incident, he wrote on a piece of paper, “Did we win?”
I just saw it too.
OK, it’s a pejorative. I was conjuring up visions of a UU splinter sect just for shrinks…
That’s wonderful!
No, it´s not intended to be pejorative, merely descriptive of a kind of denatured version of biblical religion that seems to be common in the United States at least. Smith, who coined it, is a sociologist of religion, not a polemicist.
For someone who is not of your faith, it comes across as a pejorative, and as stated, makes an assumption that any such ‘feel good faith’ should be measured against your version of Christianity as a standard.
“My version”? Hardly. I´m Pentecostal. The yardstick against which I gave to measure “feel good faiths” would fit every single (biblically sound) Protestant denomination, Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Messianic Jews, and, oh, yes, Orthodox and (most) Reform Jews. It might exclude Joel Osteen´s ilk, though ….
Now that’s a pro!