This is the one I could never figure out - a few seconds left in a football game, the kicker comes out in attempt to boot a last-second, game winning field goal. Before the ball is snapped you see him crossing himself, maybe even looking upward. I just don’t see the Deity answering a prayer of, “Let me succeed & be the hero” so the other team may fail & all of their fans be disappointed. Does the Almighty Being have an account with an online sports book &/or have a fantasy football team?
Prayers are not magical wishes.
Praying is a time to pause the hustle of life to reflect. To be thankful for what you have. To be hopeful for what you need. To consider others and their needs. And how to improve yourself and the world.
You are asking too much logic of a person in the grip of mind-killing anxiety.
You absolutely need to calm down in order to have a prayer (heh!) of accurately kicking the ball, if praying to God, Satan, Morgoth or Vishnú helps you with that you are absolutely going to pray and consider the logical implications later (if at all).
Of course not, and people who “pray” for the outcome of a sporting event are likely holding a fairly immature and transactional view of prayer and faith.
Growing up as a fan of the Green Bay Packers in the 1970s, they were a bad team, and lost most weeks. I also grew up as Catholic, a Christian denomination that features a whole lot of formalized prayer. I admit that I used to pray that, when the Packers would play the Bears, that Walter Payton (the Bears’ star running back and best player) would break his leg. But, also, I was 11 or 12 years old.
Football players are superstitious, that has nothing to do with prayer. Like when they come into the playing field they often use one leg to do the first step, or hop three times on the same foot, or wear bandages around the wrist. But that at least worked once: that is how superstitions start (–> see Operant Conditioning Chamber)
I voted never.
But I admit that prayer can be useful. Psychologically, for instance. And my granny used to recite some catholic prayer three times when boiling eggs. It was how long it took them to be au point. I myself prefer a timer, that is a little machine that goes “Ping!”. The advantage of the prayer is that unlike the timer you always carry it with you.
Although nowadays, with mobile phones, that argument has lost some weight.
Or Diego? 
You know, I was this close to adding Him to the list, but I refrained because I am sometimes afraid of tiring people with my Argentinisms 
The poll categories didn’t quite fit me. I voted the never category, but I went to Catholic school through eighth grade and recited hundreds of prayers. At the time, I didn’t really believe, and it was pretty much performative.
I’ll often tell people they’ll be in my thoughts (and they will be), but I never say I’ll pray for them, because why lie?
And i was just on the phone with some Christian friends, asking about my husband.
When they got off the phone, the wife said, “you will both be in our prayers”. And i think that’s what they meant. Not that they are going to bargain with God about healing him, but that they will be considering him (and me) when they pray. So i replied, “thank you”.
Kinda related, AFTER the win, the player/coach will thank God. As if, with everything else going on in the world/universe, he/she/it really gave a shit who won this game? AND, if the deity wanted YOU to win, they wanted the other team to LOSE?
People are stupid.
There’s also the problem when people are praying to different gods for the same outcome. Like for the two students praying to win the spelling bee:
A number of people who say they will prayer for someone, will follow up with an email later. Having someone on their personal prayer list means that they are thinking about that person and may be more likely to keep in touch.
To quote Aaron Rodgers, “God doesn’t care about football games.”
That said, I often hear pre-game convocations offered in protection of the players and upholding of sportsmanship in healthy competition and so on and so forth. Which is a little better than just thanking God for that 45 yard field goal that won the game.
So, I just returned from a 3 hour prayer service to welcome the new year. Most of that service is about thanking God and praising God, and thinking about parts of the Torah, but there are a few asks:
We ask that God will have mercy on us
We ask that God will help us to lead a life well-lived
We ask for a sweet new year.
We ask for peace for those who mourn, for Israel, and for all the people of the world
I’m probably missing some.
I broke down in tears at the point where we thanked God for the miracle of the human body, and all the tubes and vessels that need to work together for us to live. (My husband was just diagnosed with myeloma, a blood cancer.) But I also took strength from the mentions of the way the temple community cares for members, and I’ve reached out to some of those groups for help. Praying is often a communal activity, where we connect with other members of our community. That’s how I typically engage with it.
I’m sincerely glad that the exercise provided you comfort in these challenging times.
What you describe impresses me along the lines of guided group meditation and affirmation. Personally, I consider that a potentially valuable exercise so long as reference to a deity is left out of it. I know I am on the extreme end of this discussion. When we attended a UU “church”, my wife and I strongly favored eliminating all references to “god language.” My preference would have been to call the building and members something other than a “church” and “congregation.”
Perhaps a similar inquiry needs to be made WRT the word “prayer.” How many people primarily and reflexively associate prayer with communicating towards a deity?
I have a friend who is a humanist celebrant. He leads baby naming services, funerals, weddings, and other events marking passage of life, and he sometimes broadcasts meditations on the radio (on as channel that also hosts religious clergy.) He says he used to call himself an atheist, but he’s much happier now that he focuses on what he believes in, rather than what he doesn’t believe in.
I was impressed, but told him that in America, the UU Church is usually willing to provide a god-free service for most of those events, and I’ve been to a number of funerals held by UU ministers, because, you know, they have the skills.
The first portion is very much how I feel.
The quality of minister - and the degree of humanism/spirituality varies VERY MUCH from UU congregation to congregation. We were fortunate to have 2 lengthy stints with excellent Humanist ministers. It was amusing, because they would conduct a service, and the religious folk in attendance wouldn’t even realize that god - or woo - was never mentioned. When you lose a resource like that, you appreciate what you had, and how far short others fall.
My impression was that a couple of decades ago the UUA made the intentional decision to shift away from Humanism and towards spirituality - because a vague christianity-lite filled the pews and collection baskets more than rational thought.
I grew up as a Mormon, and people believe that prayers are literally answered.
One Sunday a month, the service is devoted to having people bear their testimonies, and often members will tell incidents in which God directly answered their prayers, from the mundane to the incredible.
Mormons are instructed to pray to God to receive a direct confirmation of the truth of Mormonism, that the LDS church is the only true church and that the president of the church is a true prophet and God’s mouthpiece to the world.
Mormons will pray to receive confirmation from God on who to marry, which job to take and where to find the misplaced binky so the baby will stop crying.
They also believe that anyone with the higher priesthood (most male, lay members 18 and older) can cure people through the power of prayer, although most defer to God by adding a part about God’s will.
They definitely believe that God will provide comfort to the parents and families of dead children as well as somehow making food nutritious to “strengthen and nourish our bodies.”
I never questioned why it took a prayer for God to perform that task while my heathen friends got their benefits from biochemistry.
Mormons can pray at anytime and any place, but there are special prayers said in the temples which seem to be more effective.
I prayed until I was on my way out of Mormonism, at which point I stopped. Except that time I mistakenly went down the black diamond run when skiing.
Thanks for sharing this. If you know, what is the teaching - or participants’ feelings - about why some folks’ prayer are (purportedly) answered, and others’ not? Are the lucky ones more deserving? The unfortunates need to step up their game (and donations)? Is god supposedly running some sort of divine lottery, or deciding based on merit, need, or something else?
The teaching is that all prayers are answered, but sometimes the answer is “no.”
God knows more than us mortals and in his infinite wisdom, he may not grant the particular request.