I was just sent a flash news release announcing that a “community program” titled “Prayer, Meditation and Medicine,” will be held at a location in Delaware to discuss the benefits of combining high-tech medical practices with “prayer and meditation.” This will be given by Dr. Mitchell W. Krucoff, Duke University Medical Center cardiologist and professor. He is the director of the MANTRA Study Project, in which the impact of therapies such as prayer, music, imagery and touch therapy on patients with heart disease, are recorded. Dr. Krucoff is recognized internationally for his pioneering heart research, though what portion of that research may be supernatural in nature, I cannot tell.
This program, we’re told, is “open to medical personnel, faith leaders and the general public.”
Now, I’m sure that these folks mean well, and are – somehow – convinced that prayer and “touch therapy” are effective means of medical treatment, but I hasten to remind them that the JREF million-dollar prize is available to them if they can show evidence of either of these modalities being effective, and I encourage them to make application. Evidence so far presented for the efficacy of such methods has failed to prove the case, though the benefits of music and meditation are doubtless generally beneficial to stressed patients.
I doubt that Banachek will be receiving an application for the MDC from the MANTRA Study Project...