THE POWER OF PRAYER
...my friends and their religion

Before anyone completely freaks out, take time to read this all the way through before passing judgment. I know I'm stepping into tricky territory, but being that this is my blog, I want to talk about what I'm thinking right now so here it goes. I've never been one to really believe in that whole "Power of Prayer" idea. Not that I completely disbelieved it. But you see it so many times where people say "O I was so broke but then I prayed and money came to me", when really pay day finally came around. So very quickly that whole idea about the power of prayer really started to lose it's significance or true meaning. I see it more as a 'think positive, positive things will happen' type thing. You put good energy out into the universe and hopefully that will be returned to you. And usually those people who have prayed about their situations, have gone out the next day and been more proactive about changing than they were before. That usually is what makes the difference; not solely the prayer.

With that said, I have a friend who to me has always been on the overly religious side. However when you look and what she's managed to overcome by keeping her hope in her faith, I think it would be hard for anyone not to believe she believes it. She's always been one to take her problems to God in prayer. However when she and her husband were expecting their first child, their faith was really needed. As the child was developing, they noticed she had a hole in her heart. They thought that after birth she was going to have to undergo extensive open heart surgery. They prayed about it and less than 2 weeks later, the hole was closed. The baby had more problems after she was born, some related to the heart some not, but she would always tell me she was praying about it. And with out fail or interaction from the doctors a majority of her problems solved themselves. Here 2 months later, the baby is home and doing fairly well but she still has more surgeries to undergo. The mother needs to be home with her baby and her maternity leave ends Wednesday. Her husband a few weeks ago got laid off from his job. They prayed. He now has been offered and even better newer position with more benefits that will be of help to his family. This is just a very rough and brief synopsis of what has been going on in their lives. There have been countless other times where things have appeared to be going into a very bad place but the two of them have always managed to come out unscathed. When I ask how they dealt with it all she told me was they prayed. And because she is who she is, I know it's said with truth and belief, not just as a saying.

So what is it? Is it really just about praying to an omnipotent force to change your situations? Or is it really just a way to keep positive and hopeful? I don't know. She is a really positive person. Always has been. So it could just be positive karma returning the goodness she's ALWAYS put out into the universe. Whatever it is, I admire her faith. I don't know where I lost mine or how the connection got severed. I think there's something beautiful and calming about faith like that. Maybe one day I'll get that back.