What can prayer do? More precisely, what can a person ask for and receive from God, whose prayer is sincere, pure, even suffered? Of course, a lot. And let the doubters, unbelievers, insincere and crooked smile skeptically. They forget the gospel truth: "According to your faith be it unto you."
My good friend, a spiritual person, from Odessa, Father Sergiy, once told an amazing story. His back ached. It also happens with priests. He did a lot of things: he turned to the luminaries of medicine and grandmothers-healers.
But one fine day, the priest entered the Vladimir Cathedral in Kiev. He walked both as a pilgrim and on official business. But the main thing is that Father Sergius felt as if some light force was leading him to this particular church. Having crossed the threshold of the cathedral, he, as he honestly confessed to me, suddenly clearly realized his sin as a priest and a Christian: he did not pray for recovery. How could this be? Just an eclipse has come upon a person. In the church, Father Sergius not only experienced a strong sense of guilt, but also felt hope. He began to pray earnestly, sincerely, from the bottom of his heart at the icons, especially at the famous image "Unexpected Joy". And the miracle happened: after the fortieth prayer, the pains in the back disappeared as suddenly as they appeared.
Later, Father Sergius sincerely repented of his stupidity and made vows to pray not out of "duty," so to speak, but at the behest of his heart. The priest deeply felt the passage from the Gospel, where it was about the disciples of Jesus who were unable to heal a certain youth. Christ intervened, grieved by the revealed unbelief of people. He told the boy's father that a believer can do anything. And when the disciples asked Him why they had failed to heal the boy, the Lord replied that “this kind” (He meant the demons) could not leave the boy except from prayer and fasting.
And what about science?
However, skeptics here can say: so what? It's just a coincidence: a man entered the temple - and everything passed. He could be healed, they say, in another place, but prayer has nothing to do with it. But is it? Let's not argue, but just turn to science.
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Here amazing discoveries await us. Not so long ago, scientists from Germany and Russia simultaneously discovered the so-called fourth state of consciousness. It occurs in a person during prayer. Until now, three states were usually named: wakefulness and two phases of rest, REM and slow sleep. However, scientists have proven that during prayer, the human brain works in a specific mode.
This state can be compared to the bliss of a healthy baby - such a state of a baby when he is simply happy, not knowing why. It's just that the baby feels that his loving parents are nearby, that they protect him and take care of him. It is simply happiness "for no reason" and serenity.
But such a state also grants a person a prayer, an appeal to the Heavenly Father and the Mother of God … Scientists have found out that during sincere, deep prayer people get rid of heart pains, blood pressure normalizes, stress disappears. As a result, such believers live longer and get sick less. The feeling of happiness, peace and security penetrates their souls and heals the body.
And Canadian neuropathologists and neurologists have confirmed that people who can sincerely pray practically do not experience nervous breakdowns and breakdowns. They worry less about big and small life failures, get less upset, do not get embittered and feel protected. And this, according to scientists, allows us to talk about the special functions that the nervous system and the brain of believers have.
However, not all prayer is effective. And believers are aware of this. True is the prayer that is heard by God. But what does it mean? Interestingly, it is the scientists who give the answer to this question. The prayer heard by God is precisely the one that allows us to rise above the vain, mundane and see everything around from above, to understand that there is an earthly world, but there is also a heavenly one. There is the transitory, and there is also the eternal. With such prayers, and this is amazing, rhythms in the cerebral cortex disappear or decrease. That is, a feeling of peace and enlightenment is achieved. The deeper the immersion in prayer, the more noticeable the ordering of biorhythms.
It is known that the holy martyrs, thanks to prayers and sincere faith in God, could endure physical suffering. There is a well-known example of Ambrose Optinsky. Leo Tolstoy, after a conversation with this elder, said: “This Ambrose is an absolutely holy man. I talked to him, and it became easy on my soul, I felt the closeness of God. Ambrose, meanwhile, suffered from severe bodily ailments, from which, according to doctors, he would die immediately if he were an atheist. But the elder lived 79 years. Moreover, despite constant pain, he was cheerful, encouraged everyone and gave people advice.
How prayer works
But why does prayer directly affect the brain? Yes, because human speech consists of sounds of a certain pitch, or, as scientists say, a set of certain frequencies of the sound spectrum, their combinations and amplitudes. Therefore, a prayer spoken even in a whisper is like music and is essentially a meditation.
Scientists explain the healing effect of prayer with a new look at oneself, others and the world, a departure from earthly concerns, their momentary and vanity in comparison with the eternal values revealed to man by God. So, many sick people who read prayers sincerely and for a long time overcome fear of death, despondency, gain optimism and confidence in a favorable outcome. All this leads to a natural increase in immunity, better health. The body's resistance to disease grows and healing occurs.
British scientists from the Center for the Study of the Brain in Cambridge conducted an experiment on 20 volunteers, among whom were 10 deeply religious people and the same number of atheists. Electrodes were attached to each of the participants in the experiment and weak electric shocks were passed. During the experiment, believers were asked to look at an icon with the face of Jesus Christ, and atheists - at a reproduction of one of Gauguin's paintings.
For 20 minutes of the experiment, each volunteer received 20 unpleasant electrical discharges. But the two groups perceived them differently. Those looking at the face of Christ felt completely safe and did not worry. At the same time, the devices showed that they did not experience such severe pain as those who viewed the painting of Gauguin. The device analyzing the work of the brain showed that the front lobe of the right half of the believers became more active, that is, these people themselves suppressed the pain caused to them. But atheists did not have such a brain reaction.
Interestingly, researchers at the Baptist Medical Center in Wake Forest, North Carolina predict that people will soon forget about pain relievers because meditation blocks pain much better.
Canadian scientists also recorded differences in the activity of the brain of believers and non-believers. They conducted a test that measured the activity of the cerebral cortex under different conditions. It turned out that in religious people the area of the brain is much less active, which changes human behavior under the influence of stress and emotional experiences. Scientists have shown a direct relationship: the stronger the religious feeling, the calmer this area of the brain and the fewer mistakes a person makes in a variety of situations.
And a star with a star says …
But the facts are important not only of healings, but also of a kind of protection of those praying and their loved ones, those who are affected by prayer in different life situations. Let us remember the soldiers who returned home thanks to the prayers of their mothers, relatives and friends, guarded by prayer in wanderings and persecution, hardships and hardships … They say: "God heard the prayer." And now it became clear that these are not just words.
After all, we all, our organism, the whole Universe is a rhythm. Pulse, breathing, movement of waters and winds, planets and the Sun. Stars pulsate, comets and galaxies follow their own paths. And sincere prayer, its rhythm, voiced and sent outside, into the Universe, does not disappear, it sounds and sounds, reaching the One who gave a person this gift - the gift of speech. The Bible says: "In the beginning was the Word …" And we are just beginning to comprehend the deep meaning of this phrase.
Meanwhile, the miracles of prayer continue. At the end of last year, after persistent prayers, a blind girl Elena Melnichenko regained her sight in the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra. The girl's optic nerve tumor disappeared. Healing took place near the miraculous icon of the Most Holy Theotokos "The Tsaritsa" in the Church of All the Venerable Fathers of the Caves. Israeli and Ukrainian doctors, who treated Elena unsuccessfully, confirmed the fact of healing.
Petro Dvoretsky