Geoffrey W. Sutton PhD, Psychology and Culture

What are people praying about?  When it comes to the most popular topics of prayer among the 27 millions of UK adults who say they pray, family (71%) leads the way, followed by thanking God (42%), praying for healing (40%) and friends (40%). Worldwide issues, such as praying for global poverty or natural disasters, rank seventh on the list (24%), highlighting the challenge for Tearfund to encourage more people to pray for issues of extreme poverty. ( Tearfund , 2018)  Why pray? Among those who pray, half (49%) agree that God hears their prayers and two in five (39%) agree that prayer changes the world. Praying also makes people feel better, with those who do so most likely to say they feel reassured or hopeful after having prayed (40% say this). ( Tearfund , 2018) Ad. Get help with Creating Surveys Available on AMAZON  More results from Tearfund One in five (20%) UK adults say they pray regularly (at least once a month). While 51% of U...

Pope Francis prayed for God’s protection:  “We seek refuge under your protection O Holy Mother of God.” ( Vatican News , 2020, March 26). Southern Baptist pastor, Tony Perkins, encouraged people to pray for the protection of our families ( Perkins, 2020, March 12 ). Amid crisis, whether coronavirus, a natural disaster, a terrorist attack or another calamity, we must not allow the mockery of the anti-faith crowd to drown out our prayers for the hurting, for the protection of our families, our communities, and our country. Let the mockers mock, but let the people pray to the great Physician first and then get to work helping the sick. Around the world, religious people pray to God or gods for divine protection from evil. In western cultures, Catholics, Protestants, and adherents of other branches of Christianity pray for God’s protection from the Coronavirus in 2020. As Christians get sick and die by the thousands, do such prayers for protection engender false ...