I’ll put it this way: Metallica singer James Hetfield, who was raised in a Christian Scientist home (and saw his mother die unnecessarily as a result) has said, “If a deer knew how to fix a broken leg, it would.”
All faith healing stories brings up this old joke for me:
A faith healer calls up to audience members who wish to be healed. Martha, a woman who has walked with crutches for over 30 years and Harry, a man with a terrible lisp. The healer asks them to step behind a curtain while he calls upon the power god almighty to heal them.
He then says, “Martha, throw those evil crutches over the curtain!” The crutches land on the stage as the audience gasps. The healer then says, “Harry! Speak to us!”
Harry says, “Martha jusht fell on her asssth!”
Faith doesn’t heal. Maybe faith can help you feel more confident, but that’s about all you can get. It’s all the same snake oil sold by the swift-talking man with the fancy car.
The church I was raised in believes in supernatural healing, but my pastor always taught you to go to a doctor, too. He said that God gave us medicine as part of his promise to heal us. He also said that, even if you think you received a supernatural healing, you go to a doctor and have them check. It’s not a lack of faith, it’s a testimony to the world that the healing actually happened.
I ran into the type that Trinopus is decrying the same way the rest of you guys probably did–on TV. By the same people preaching the prosperity gospel.
Unfortunately, your friend has become mentally ill.
There’s really no other way to put it, when people let their own strange interpretation of religion take over their lives to the extent that they endanger their own lives and destroy their social connections by exhibiting bizarre behaviour.
If this was anything other than religious-based, they would be put away for their own safety. We extend way, WAY too much leeway to “religions” that are in actual fact mental illness.
It wasn’t your fault. She got religion and lost her manners. If you’re talking to a friend who doesn’t agree with you on an issue and that friend asks you to change the subject, you change the subject.
She also forgot how to talk to you as her friend.
I’m sorry for this. I’ve had it happen, too, though not for the reason “pro-faith-healer won’t shut up about it”.
ETA: I am stealing Locrian’s joke!
“Golf clap” be damned, that gets ::raucous applause::
Trinopus, I’m sorry about your lost friendship. “Against stupidity, the gods themselves rage in vain”.
Faith healing is either stupid, for those who actually believe they are healing, or cynical, for the Peter Popov types who are scamming people for a buck. I’d lump psychics in with faith healers; at least the ones like Sylvia Browne, who “help” people who are looking for missing loved ones. Like faith healers, they are preying on the emotionally vulnerable. Disgusts me.
The people that eschew medicine in favor of faith healing or prayer always remind me of the joke about the person stuck in a flood saying God will save him.
In the case of faith healing, God would say, “I sent you an EMT, a nurse, and a doctor. What more do you expect?”
He’d probably do better to take a pill.
Among the many true nut cases I’ve seen come to Thailand, and we get a lot of them, was a fellow American who at one point decided faith was all he needed. He stopped wearing his glasses – whether he actually threw them away, I don’t know – and declared his faith in god would be enough to restore his eyesight. As you can guess, he kept running into things.
(This guy has been in and out of psychiatric wards in Bangkok over the years and is still here. He writes spiritually related travel fluff in the local media while teaching English.)
The Bible discusses healings but also discusses healthy living (ex. rules against gluttony) and medicine (Luke was a doctor). It also encourages people to have compassion for the sick and infirmed.
Examples:
Luke 14:13-14 - But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.
Another favorite of mine is Luke 14: 21 where the rich ruler offered a great feast but all of his rich, able bodied friends wouldnt come so :Then the owner of the house became angry and ordered his servant, ‘Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame.’
I work with Camp Barnabas, a summer camp for kids and adults with special needs. I tell you I’ve seen everything. Kids in wheelchairs for various things, birth defects, chronic diseases, developmental issues, etc… Now could God heal them? Yes I feel he could. Why doesnt he? I dont know. However I do feel it gives the rest of us an opportunity to serve.
It’s kind of like in Charles Dickens “A Christmas Carol” where the crippled Tiny Tim says him being in church would remind the others of how Jesus’s healed the cripple. Plus his infirmity was a catalyst to the salvation of Scrooge.
Finally in the long run I feel heaven and eternity is the goal for every believer. Trials will come your way and its how we respond to them and live according to God’s word that’s important.
Very nice bit of witnessing/proselytizing there, Urbanredneck, but could you maybe tie it into the topic of the Pitting? Thanks.
And for some, the sooner the better.
Could be 1: Fictional characters cannot cure anyone. Or 2: God is evil.
As a Christian I think that relying on prayer to cure disease can be dangerous, if you use it to the exclusion of modern science and medicine.
I believe in prayer, I really do. What do I pray for, or about, when someone is sick? I offer thanks to God that people were willing to study and become doctors, nurses, and all sorts of medical professionals, and that the work they do will ease pain and suffering. That researchers put in the time to discover new treatments and drugs. I pray that the faith of the person I care about stays strong in the face of pain and adversity, because we were never promised perfect lives.I give thanks for the lives of people like the recently deceased Frances Oldham Kelsey, who, working for the FDA, pretty much kept thalidomide out of the US and saved the lives of countless babies in this country.
God gave people brains for a reason. We are supposed to use them. The cliche “God helps those who help themselves” is true, we aren’t supposed to sit on our butts, being lazy and lmaking Him do all the work.
Back when my state of Kansas was being obtuse about evolution being taught in schools, I loved this “interview” of God, concerning evolution, that was published in the Washington Post.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A27731-2005Apr5.html
Heh, heh. Croissant. 
When I was younger – college age – I was a very hostile anti-religionist. But a bulletin board discussion group, not unlike this one, helped me back away from that kind of extremism. A very nice Minister took the time to work with me and help me get over my anger.
That’s healing! That’s the sort of ministering I can respect.
I have no problem (nowadays!) with people praying for wisdom, or praying for patience (“and I want it now!”) 
or praying “Thy will be done.”
It gives me the creeps when they engage in Speaking in Tongues, but, right, whatever, not my cuppa but it doesn’t pick my pocket or break my arm.
So…yeah! I can agree with what you’ve written here.
You work with a camp for special needs children, but you use the word “cripple”? :dubious:
I suspect that the way he treats the children is more relevant than the words he uses when he is talking about them. Or quoting Dickens.