> This whole prayer thing. I don't understand it.
>
> Let's take as given that there's an all-knowing, all-seeing, all-powerful Supreme Being known as "God". Why is there need for prayer?
>
> Your aunt is sick and dying. You, your family, and several friends pray for your aunt to get better. Is this going to change anything? God already knows that your aunt is going to die. He sees that she's there, in bed, and she's going to die. He could change this, but he knows that all living things die and it's your aunt's turn. So why is everyone praying?
>
> Are they trying to let God know that 32 people don't want your aunt to die? He knows this. Are they trying to get God to change what is going to happen?
>
> They are? Then doesn't that mean that the people who pray are the ones who will (or could) get things done? That if I -- and all my family and all my friends -- gather around my dying aunt, wailing in anguish, nothing will happen even if all of us have been extremely good as God deems "extremely good" to be. But if we all pray, if enough of us cast a celestial ballot to change the course of events, something will change? Is God a democracy?
>
> Or is God so stubborn that he won't do anything good (like not let your aunt die) unless someone prays to him? Is God a dog that only responds to treats?
>
> Is there any point to prayer aside from making the prayee feel like he or she is doing something?
>
> -Faux "Wow! Not only did I join a religious discussion, I started one!" Pas

These are all questions I have wondered about, because praying for something to happen/not to happen doesn't even seem to be internally consistent with what people who believe in prayer believe about God. I'd add to the above:

I've heard some people say that you shouldn't pray for specific things you want, such as not letting your aunt die; you should basically only pray that "God's will should be done". This seems even stranger than praying for specific things, because how can God's will NOT be done? Surely all you're saying is "God, you're going to make things happen according to what you already had planned, and I don't know what that plan is, but, uh, just so you know, I'm cool with that." And again, I don't see any reason why it should be necessary to say this -- either from God's point of view or the person who is praying.

The only point in prayer I've ever been able to see (again, this is assuming belief in God) is praise of God or thanking God for something. There are some problems I can see with these too, but they don't confuse me nearly so much as the idea of praying in order to ask God to do things for you.

On a complete tangent, when *not* assuming belief in God (ie, from my own viewpoint), I can see that one reason for prayer might be similar to positive-thinking exercises in which the desired result is brought about simply because the constant focus on that result (whether through prayer, self-affirmation statements or whatever else people use in those cases) subconsciously makes the person work towards it. Of course, this isn't going to work if it's something like stopping your aunt from dying, but it might work if it's something you CAN change yourself, and maybe just need an extra boost to believe you can. Please don't confuse this paragraph with the ones above, which are from a completely different perspective. I personally do not believe that prayer works, and consider myself an agnostic tending towards atheist. However, I'm very interested in finding out how religious people view the mechanism of prayer (for want of a better term), because this is an aspect of religion that genuinely puzzles me.