20 replies to this topic

[Willow]

Faith Healing or Laying on of Hands, though not scientifically proven effective, its practitioners has often cited that theres evidence of it being successful, I personally am alittle weary when it comes to faith healing, being wiccan, I have done rituals for people that have been sick and said blessings but faith healers i'm alittle sketchy on, i've not heard of one thats had a great success rate and tend to think they prey on a persons emotional state to con them out of money(those that charge for their services) What do you all think?

[randystreu]

As a person who believes in God and Christ, I do by extension believe in a sort of faith healing. I just don't think it happens that often.

I find that many percieved physical ills are really maladies of the mind. Which is why some forms of such healing works. It's a spiritual placebo. It's like when you get the hiccups. I once invented a cure, and it worked. I'm not really -that- intelligent, so i figure it must have been a psychosematic thing.

[aloha_spirit]

Some of the Faith Healers are phonies - they just want to make a quick buck.  Same with some of the "psychics" who operate 900 numbers.  Just because some are obvious fakes doesn't mean the real deal doesn't exist.

As a Christian, I believe in the power of faith and the laying on of hands.  I don't know exactly why it works sometimes but not others.  It might be the placebo effect, the power of the mind, or all that positive energy.

[MoonChild]

first of all - there is NO HEALING that happens without FAITH! The patient needs faith in the doctor and the system so as to get the said effect of the medicines. It is not the body that heals, but it is the mind that makes it heal.

[mellilotflower]

I have a friend, she started off proffesional life as a nurse, and ended up working in a hospice.  She then went on to learn about alternative methods of, not neccasarily healing, but of relieving pain and stress through work at the hospice.  She got into message (sp?) and then chrystal healing- aligning chakras and such and seems to have some very positive effects.  She takes it all very seriously, and is very wary of the adverse effects of that sort of treatment if it is used at the wrong times or for the wrong things...
That is all relaxation though, and stress is well known to increase feelings of pain and decrease the effectiveness of the immune system.

[NocturnalCantaloupe]

I agree with you Moon, healing does not take place without faith in some form or another.  

I heard a Wiccan tell it best when asked about spells and "spell recipes"  She said that she wouldn't put up spell recipes becuase it's personal. Each person can/should make their own and that it's the faith in them that makes them work.

There have been studies as well.  It was found that people that "beleived they were being healed" healed much faster than those that did not.  Gosh I wish I could remmber where it was.  It was a TV show actually.  Basically they were saying that the group of people that prayed, and beleived their prayer would help actually got better.

In fact I think it had something to do with knee surgery.

One group had knee surgery, the others had no surgery, but were told that they were being "cured"  (I wish I could remember the details, I'm probably screwing it all up LOL!).

The poeple that didn't have the surgery got through rehabilitiation faster than those that did!  So, it wasn't the surgery that helped rehabilitate/repair the knees of that group of people!  It was "mind over matter."  

[MoonChild]

tht is the same concept behindthe good old "pep pills" ;D

[NocturnalCantaloupe]

Yup!  

[hawkerdriver]

Of course, we all know that it has yet to be understood what 40% of our brains do.  Could be part of it.

[Justa]

Ummm, could it be that the people who had the knee surgery required longer to heal, as do most people post op, because of the added trauma to the area during surgery.  If you have never seen a surgery, let's just say that the joints get manipulated a lot, and there is a lot of bruising afterwards.  In order for the test to be accurate, they would have had to compare people who all had surgery, and had half of them go to "healers", and the other half go without.

Of course, they say if you have a good outlook on life, then your body heals faster in general.  If somebody is depressed, their mind is fighting the depression as well as the other malady.  So if somebody "believes" in faith healing, then that is just a positive frame of mind which with or without the laying on of hands would result in the same outcome.

So what about the evangelists who have "the power".  Nice little guilt trip they put on you, "If you accept Jesus, truly accept him, then you will be healed".  Soooo, if you don't heal, guess what, you aren't as good a "believer" as you think.  

[NocturnalCantaloupe]

Well like I said, I could be completely wrong with the details, But I do see your point

[whispers_of_fire]

Hmmm...one of my Profs in University was a Faith Healer, cool guy and he taught me a lot...but Faith's [glow=green,2,300]ESSENTIAL[/glow] to the process

[freyjasdottir]

I know I mentioned this is another thread but here's my take...when I was in elementary school I'd get bronchitis twice a year and was constantly ill....in fourth grade (about 10) my Grandmother took me to the minister of the non-denominational church she went to and they did a laying on of hands and prayer service for me.  I never have had bronchitis since then, I had my first sinus infection at 21 and now my 2nd at 30 and I had pneumonia at 28.  So whether or not it worked or I just went from very sick to very healthy for some of other reason I can't say.  But I do know other then migraines and female issues I've been an extremely healthy person

[Justa]

Akthra, sorry, I didn't mean to imply you were incorrect. In fact you probably have the facts exact, or pretty close to it.  A lot of "scientific studies" will compare two groups which appear similar, but in reality aren't, in order to prove their point.

As for the bronchitis, it is not uncommon for children to have it as youngsters, (the same with asthma) and outgrow it.  The reason I say this is because my daughter also suffered from it as a child, and was hospitalized once or twice a year with it really bad, but as she got older, the attacks were less severe, and now she never gets it.   The only difference is that I didn't have a "laying on of hands".  It just happened. It could be coincidence that the timing of your laying on of hands happened to come around the same time as your body maturing enough to become more resistant, or, who knows, maybe it was the laying on of hands.  Either way, I am glad that you stopped suffering from it.

I wonder if Faith is just a mindset that puts you in a positive mood.  As I stated earlier, it is well known throughout the medical world that if you have a positive outlook, your body tends to recover quicker than if you are in a depressed state of mind.  

[Justa]

Hmmm, I just thought of something, maybe I have the wrong idea of "faith healing".  When you say faith healing, I think "televangelist" right away.  You know, the guys who smack you in the forehead and make you walk, albeit backwards, stumbling from the force of the hit. (Just kidding, kinda)

When I was a teenager, I was approached by a man and a lady.  They were pleasant and started a nice polite conversation.  They noticed I had a medic alert chain, and said that Jesus had called to them to specifically find me and cure me.  I was allergic to penicillin.  In order to be cured though, they had to pray for the "evil spirits" to leave my body, and I had to accept Jesus unquestionably into my heart.  At the end of their little song and dance routine, they told me that if I truly accepted Jesus, I could go to the hospital right then and get the biggest shot of penicillin possible, and nothing would happen to me.  Of course I didn't follow through with it, because once again, if I died, they would just shrug and say, "Hmm, guess he didn't accept Jesus".  No sweat off of their backs.
 So was that a type of "laying on of hands", or of faith healing?  I don't know.  I think I will tend to stick with what medical science has proven.  I think if Faith Healing or laying on of hands really worked, there would be less disease and suffering in the world.