Both studies are “well-controlled,” preliminary trials “providing more evidence that there’s something to it all,” says Blair Justice, Ph.D., professor of psychology and psychobiologist (mind-body medicine) at the University of Texas School of Public Health in Houston.
Justice, who has followed prayer in medical research for several decades, reviewed the reports for WebMD.
Prayer in Medicine Research
“Research into prayer in medicine has been going on a lot longer than is reflected in mainstream journals,” Justice tells WebMD. “Since the 1980s, there have been several well-controlled prospective studies, good evidence that this wasn’t some product of a good imagination.”
Some of the studies conducted in Europe involved nonhuman organisms like enzyme cells, bacteria, plants, and animals. None of which could be affected by other complicating factors, including faith.
Doctors assigned groups to pray for their growth; then the prayers were reversed, and people were praying against growth. Each time, the plants responded according to the focus of the prayers.
“There seems to be something to it,” he says.
Current technology does not allow researchers to understand the mechanism behind prayer in medicine — what makes it work. It’s much like gravity and other natural phenomena that were considered mysterious forces by earlier cultures, Justice tells WebMD.
“Keppler was accused of being insane when he said tides were due to the tug of lunar gravity, even Galileo considered it to be ravings of a lunatic — until Marconi proved the theory,” he says.
“It’s just like anything else, you don’t have to believe in it for prayer to have an effect,” says Justice.
