I don’t know.
From the time I was a child, I was taught not to take things on faith. If something can’t be demonstrated with evidence, there’s no reason to believe it. My parents subscribed to this belief, yet also attended church regularly and prayed.
They saw sufficient evidence that God was listening. To date, I’ve seen many conflicting reports but have yet to be convinced either way.
This site exists not so I can personally promote a position one way or the other. Instead, it’s my goal to gather information about the efficacy of prayer — from scientific studies, from the anecdotes of people joining the forum, from newspaper articles and newscasts — in one repository and encourage open discussion of that evidence. I’ll be storing links to scientific papers, news articles, and the like in the Library (see LIBRARY link in top navbar).
I’ve set up a forum which I hope you will join; just click the FORUM button at the top of the page! People of all beliefs (or lack thereof) are welcome to join.
If you know of research which has been completed or is underway, please provide a link. If you have stories to share, please do. If you just want to discuss what you see in the forum, do that!
UPDATE: A friend emailed me about what could be an interesting experiment. I’ve added the link PRAY4PZ at the top, where you can read about this interesting development!
God does listen. God does answer prayers. But it is not that simple. I think an good author on the subject is Hans Kung (epistimological discussion).
However, if you want my personal ideas at this juncture I think it is very hard to discern if God answers prayers when you study these things as an aggregate, because God is the objective working in the subjective, that is, an experience which is yours.
In my personal experience God answers prayers.
Thanks, Mark! Maybe you’d like to expand on that thought in the Forum?
Prayer
A 50/50 chance….
50/50 chance God will answer, or that He is listening to you?
i was sad and googled does god listen to us.
here is wg=hat i found
http://www.ramakrishna.org/activities/message/weekly_message31.htm