Prayer chains are just glorified gossip circles...(rantish)

[mcctatas]

So my in-laws go to this fundie church...big into the power of prayer etc., anyway, I'm shopping at Target today and this woman keeps looking at me like she knows me. Long story short, I say "Can I help you with something?" to which she replies "Aren't you X and X's daughter in law?" , "yes" I reply. She then says "We've been praying that your MS will not progress any further, alot of God's warriors are looking out for you":wtf:

Not only do I not know this woman, I come to find out that a bunch of fundie freaks are praying for me?! This is not Christian, this is gossip plain and simple. I was so upset I left the store without getting the thing I went there for in the first place. What if a potential future employer is on that prayer chain and when I graduate, apply for jobs etc. decides not to hire me based on my MS?! I am so fucking mad I could spit fire:grr:

[Lars39]

1. I hate the damned things. It is not pleasant being on the receiving

end of these prayer-chain gossips. It is a supreme act of privacy invasion.
There's a HUGE difference in wishing someone well and divulging the intimate details of their condition to the congregation. :mad: Sorry you ran in to that.

[madeline_con]

2. " alot of God's warriors are looking out for you"

You should have reminded her what "God's warriors" did during the Crusades! EW! That's creepy, even if they think they're helping, they should limit their prayers to those who ask to be put on "the list".

[mcctatas]

3. If I had been thinking I would have said...

"Well I'll make sure my priest returns the favor for your congregation"...the church in question is rabidly anti-Catholic...they even use the retrograde term "papists". That would have given her something to really pray about;)

[PDJane]

4. Gah.

My experience with Georgia was a woman who, while I was trying to either swallow or throw up the bit of breakfast stuck in my throat, decided to give me a prayer healing in the washroom of a Cracker Barrel. The good thing is that it apparently made her feel better.........

I'm sorry you have to deal with this stuff.

[madeline_con]

11. O. M. G.

That's like a scene out of a comedy. :rofl:

[0007]

5. I sympathize with everything you say about you're experience with

these wacko's. My nature would have been to be extra rude, and then latter regret my behavior. It's damn if you do and damned if you don't.

[leftstreet]

6. You shoulda thanked her, then asked her to also pray for your in-laws

"they're drinking again."

:-)

[elehhhhna]

36. ding ding we have a winner!!!

[TexasLawyer]

40. Perfect!

[journalist3072]

7. You're upset that people are praying for you?

I'm sorry, but that's truly sad.

James 5:16 (King James version) says:

"The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much."

I think it's wonderful that you have people praying for you. So what does it matter that they don't know you?

You know what that's called? Intercessory prayer. It's called "standing in the gap."

People are praying to Christ, on your behalf.

A good friend of mine at work had a terrible tragedy in her family almost 2 weeks ago. And so not only have I been praying for her, but I asked my mother (who doesn't know her) to also pray for my co-worker's strength and endurance during this difficult time.

[Lars39]

9. It's not the prayers, it's the spreading of one's medical information

that is wrong.

[journalist3072]

31. You do have a point there..

Maybe the more appropriate thing would have been for them to say "Please pray for X, as she is experiencing some health challenges right now." And then not have gone into any further detail.

But I also think you have to look at their intentions. I don't think they meant any harm.

[erinlough]

33. I think they do....

they assume you are incapable of having a personal relationship with Christ! What is the deal? The more prayer he hears the better chance you have of getting his attention? That has always seemed stupid to me. And do you think that you have a more secure connection with God, that you will get results where I won't? That is insulting to me.

[journalist3072]

34. That's not what they think at all...

There's nothing wrong with someone asking people to pray for them (or someone else) that a particular need will be met.

Again, that is called intercessory prayer, and "standing in the gap" for someone. Praying to Christ, on someone else's behalf.

[erinlough]

35. That is not something I would do and is not in my belief system.

I feel a personal nature that is deep enough that I do not need another persons intercession. You changed the playing field also when you state "there is nothing wrong with someone asking people to pray for them" I agree. I just don't agree it is anyone elses place to ask for prayer for someone else without their permission. What gap? I don't understand a gap in God's grace.

[Book Lover]

39. And what's the point of it?

What is the good that comes from intercessory prayer? Is the OP's MS supposed to get better now and only now that God hears these extra prayers? And if there were no extra prayers, God wouldn't make the MS stop?

[mcctatas]

10. I am upset that strangers are given not only my private medical details...

but also my name to go along with them. I'm upset that these people also pray for things like George Bush to win elections and for gay men to come to Jesus lest they be cast into the "lake of hell fire". If I want to disclose my intimate life to someone and if I ask for their prayers, fine...if not, pray for someone else, not me, not to tittilate their pity bones and give them something to talk about besides their own screwed up life!

* on edit...asking one person to pray for a stranger is a lot different than getting on the phone and doing a calling tree to solicite prayers from an army of "God's Warriors:rant:

[daleo]

18. What if the stranger was Jewish or Muslim?

"People are praying to Christ, on your behalf", might go against their religion.

[niyad]

20. it is pure arrogance, and it is sad that YOU do not seem to understand

this tiny little fact.

as a pagan, and a healer, it is a standard rule that one does not do healing work unless specifically asked, or given permission, because to do so unasked and uninvited is to violate free will.

[anitar1]

22. you sound very fundie. Everything should be done according to

your beliefs ?? If I need prayer , I ask for it. Not have someone else decide I need it. That is a real invasion, IMO.

[journalist3072]

30. So because I believe in prayer, I'm a fundie?

Please don't lump me into the same category with people like Pat Robertson, James Dobson, et al. Who I don't believe exemplify the true teaches of Jesus Christ at all.

I'm simply someone who believes in the healing power of prayer, because that's what the Bible teaches us.

[Occulus]

27. When these people pray for me

it's because they see me as a filthy abomination to their so-called "god".

Thanks, but no thanks. If I were their child, praying "for" me would include reparative therapy.

Fuck 'em. All of 'em. With a two-inch post studded with shards of broken shale.

[Hello_Kitty]

8. Wow!! That's unbelievable!

Unfortunately, the scenario you mentioned regarding employers finding out stuff about you is not off the mark. These fundie mega churches are sprouting up all over the place and a lot of my co-workers go to them. My company has employee affiliation groups and the biggest by far is the Bible Based Xtian one. I've noticed that most of the managers in my department belong to it. I sense that it's almost a requirement to get ahead. It wouldn't surprise me if they have those prayer chains right on company premises where they discuss co-workers' personal issues.

I thought 12 step programs were bad about stuff like that (Anonymous, my ass) but this is just awful!

[0007]

12. I went to M.D. Anderson this last week for my cancer check up.

The lady who was gonna take care of Diego, my parrot, asked if she could say a prayer for me. I said, NO. Thinking, she may fall to her knees and start a prayer.

She said, why? I said, I believe in a power that knows your prayer before it ever gets to God. The lady told me to find someone else to take care of Diego. Which I gladly obliged.

I hate this kind of shit ya half to jump through to be a human.

[tx_dem41]

13. How do they know you have MS?

Who told them? That is whom you should be upset with.

[mcctatas]

19. My mother in law...

and she is who I am primarily upset with...although the presumption of a practical stranger to approach me like that was kind of startling.

[elehhhhna]

37. "startling" is a good word for it. You should call the strangerlady and

in an embarrassed tone tell her she must be mistaken and you have no such illness, and wherever did she get such an awful idea? That'll get the prayer chain spinnin'.

[mcctatas]

41. Ooooh that's good...

maybe I could follow with "perhaps you should pray that my MIL doesn't suffer with alzheimers too long before God calls her home" :evilgrin:

[Raydawg1234]

14. Maybe they realy care

Not all religous people are bad, Some people really do care.

Although I am from Connecticut and we don't really have many Fundie churches.

[0007]

16. Not all religious people are good either. The ones that do

indeed care are extremely rare.

[Raydawg1234]

17. Strange it seems that the ones who go to church all the time don't

while the normal ones who go twice a year do!

[waiting for hope]

15. So sorry you were

involuntary involved in a fundie past time - BTW, what was she doing at Target? Are not they sitting on the fence with the war on Christmas?

[mcctatas]

24. You're right!!!

I should have asked her when the war on Christmas ended!! And...who won?:rofl:

[sandnsea]

21. I can't stand it

Very little annoys me more than people who believe prayer is the reason this one or that one avoided tragedy. The logical conclusion is that either God hates individual people or God has a bizarre idea of how much His loved ones ought to endure. The best that prayer can provide, if anything, is comfort and strength to those who are suffering. And maybe some real world assistance by those in the gossip, er, prayer chain.

[Sapphocrat]

23. "God warrior," eh?

So that phrase wasn't just something Crazy "Trading Spouses" Lady pulled out of her butt. Guess we've learned another part of the see-krit code of the Church of Delusional Fundies Who Know What's Best for You.

Anyway, you're right to be furious. I would be.

Who tipped off these "God warriors" about your MS? Your MIL?

[knitter4democracy]

25. That was a bad situation.

I ask my mom to pray for my health concerns all the time, and I know that, on occasion, she's asked others in her church to pray for me as well. Honestly, I'm fine with it, but then again, I don't know most of them and don't live that close to them, either.

For that woman to even say anything was odd. I've never heard of someone doing that outside of church. I grew up in a small town, and everyone knew everyone's business, but very rarely did they get in one's face about it.

I wonder why she felt a need to even say anything. She could've just said that she goes to church with your MIL and to say hi and leave it at that. That's what most people do.

God's warriors? *sigh* :eyes: I haven't heard that phrase in awhile (well, ever since leaving an evangelical church and graduating from their college). It's an older one that maybe is coming back in favor. It is based on the God's Armor symbol that St. Paul used, but some people take the symbol too far.

As for the gossip angle, it does have that side to it, but prayer circles are usually more about doing something, anything to feel better about a bad situation. I knit prayer shawls for loved ones who are having a hard time or bad health or whatever, and I've found that I probably get more out of the experience (as time in prayer to process what's going on) than the recipient does. Maybe your MIL feels really helpless about your situation and felt a need to ask others to help in the only way she knew how.

[Ezlivin]

26. Prayers allow the Xian to continue to ignore the problem

By thinking for a few fevered moments, the Xian then feels "something has been done" and continues with his/her day.

When I was a faithful member of a huge fundamentalist church, they had a Wednesday night prayer service that I attended for the four years I was a member there. Every Wednesday we'd get a green piece of paper with names and information. I prayed for this one fellow named Charles for a few months (he was a veteran in a room at the VA hospital).

I decided that prayer wasn't enough and that I had to visit this man. He was in a so-called "Stryker" frame bed. It tilted back and forth many times a day. It was an old-fashioned solution that preceded the ventilator. He was strapped in and watching television. He'd been in the same room for over 17 years at that point. When I asked if he would like me to read to him, he just shook his head. "I don't need visitors," he said.

I wondered how many of my fellow Xians had been to visit him or any others.

He died a couple of years later and I always wondered about the "life" he lived.

My experience during my 15 years of hardcore fundamentalist involvement was that most of the time, people were talked about, prayed over, but never visited. It was a salve for one's conscience to pray. That was all that needed to be done since God took it from there.

It was a wonderful way to gossip without gossiping.

"We need to pray for Mrs. Brown. Her husband is into pornography."

[SpaceCatMeetsMars]

28. I hear ya

My mother asked all her religious friends to pray for me for years. I have always been mostly a nerdy, bookworm type of a person who stays home and reads a book and is perfectly happy. But she must have been making me sound like the Whore of Babylon or something. When I encounter one of her friends or get a card from this one aunt, they always say something like, "I am SO HAPPY for you and ___ !" (Mr. Spacecat). The subtext is like, "Wow, I can't believe it! The LIBERAL FEMINIST actually caught herself a MAN and managed to keep him!"

The whole attitude they have is condescending and judgmental, especially since they don't even know a thing about me.

It does feel like a violation to hear that people who don't even know you have been busy discussing your life.

[jokerman93]

29. cultish

mcctatas, your story is disturbing. I've been convinced for a long time now, these big-box churches represent a new kind of for-profit corporate political cult using religious features to get at the consumer's core personality and values. Selling religion is the most effective way to captivate a market niche while producing and delivering a product that consists of almost NOTHING at all.

-- Well, ok that's harsh. They DO sell trash politics, coloring book piety, and the right to utter platitudes and feel superior for reasons not entirely clear to anyone else.

I wouldn't be surprised if we eventually discover these self-aggrandizing "God Warriors" also start helping establish their lord's kingdom on earth by deciding whose "side" people are on based on second and third hand-gossip. Who needs a surveillance state when you have these happy idiots running things?

Religion -- if you can see it, hear it, vote for it, march to it, pay for it with a credit card, obey it, or believe in it -- then it isn't G*d. It's politics.

Prayer trees, huh? :wtf: I wonder if they're also developing cells for neighborhood watch. Good structure for raising a mob.

Yeah I'm a cynical SOB. Sue me. Oh...and Merry Fucking Christmas.

:rant:

[elehhhhna]

38. OH HELL YEAH! to your 3rd paragraph, jman

[erinlough]

32. I do so agree

I was involved in one once in a smallish church and I quickly quit because it was apparent to me that it was a reason to gossip. Many people in here are talking about mega-churches being the problem, but I think it is worse in the small church. You see everyone all the time and know them intimately. You have heard all these things in prayer group and then you sit next to them in church...I always felt creepy and wrong so I quit and gave instructions to all of them to never pray for me. They probably prayed for me as soon as I hit the door, but I gave them something to think about.