richard_dawkins_-_the_god_delusion

T H E G O D H Y P O T H E S I S 63
spoiled by sceptical vibrations. Dr Benson and his team monitored
1,802 patients at six hospitals, all of whom received coronary
bypass surgery. The patients were divided into three groups. Group
1 received prayers and didn't know it. Group 2 (the control group)
received no prayers and didn't know it. Group 3 received prayers
and did know it. The comparison between Groups 1 and 2 tests for
the efficacy of intercessory prayer. Group 3 tests for possible
psychosomatic effects of knowing that one is being prayed for.
Prayers were delivered by the congregations of three churches,
one in Minnesota, one in Massachusetts and one in Missouri, all
distant from the three hospitals. The praying individuals, as
explained, were given only the first name and initial letter of the
surname of each patient for whom they were to pray. It is good
experimental practice to standardize as far as possible, and they
were all, accordingly, told to include in their prayers the phrase
'for a successful surgery with a quick, healthy recovery and no
complications'.
The results, reported in the American Heart Journal of April
2006, were clear-cut. There was no difference between those
patients who were prayed for and those who were not. What a surprise.
There was a difference between those who knew they had
been prayed for and those who did not know one way or the other;
but it went in the wrong direction. Those who knew they had been
the beneficiaries of prayer suffered significantly more complications
than those who did not. Was God doing a bit of smiting, to show
his disapproval of the whole barmy enterprise? It seems more probable
that those patients who knew they were being prayed for
suffered additional stress in consequence: 'performance anxiety', as
the experimenters put it. Dr Charles Bethea, one of the researchers,
said, 'It may have made them uncertain, wondering am I so sick
they had to call in their prayer team?' In today's litigious society, is
it too much to hope that those patients suffering heart complications,
as a consequence of knowing they were receiving
experimental prayers, might put together a class action lawsuit
against the Templeton Foundation?
It will be no surprise that this study was opposed by theologians,
perhaps anxious about its capacity to bring ridicule upon religion.
The Oxford theologian Richard Swinburne, writing after the study