An Oregon jury decided that a couple who prayed when their son fell ill, consistent with their faith, are guilty of criminally-negligent homicide. Did God fail to answer their prayer, or were they members of a cult to which He doesn’t listen? The church’s “success” rate suggests the latter.
A Clackamas County, Ore., jury found a faith healing couple guilty of criminally negligent homicide for failing to seek medical help for their son.Jeff and Marci Beagley were convicted Tuesday, nearly two years after their 16-year-old son, Neil, died.
When Neil grew sick in 2008, the parents called family members and friends to lay their hands on him and pray for healing. Marci on Friday testified that her son said he didn’t need to or want to go to the doctor.
“We waited out and tried to make a decision doing the best we could,” said the mother, who is part of the controversial Followers of Christ Church, which promotes faith healing.
The mother said the decision to not go to the emergency room was influenced partly by her faith and partly by her son’s wishes.
The defense argued that the Beagleys were not aware of how sick Neil was and “believed in the healing powers of God.”
Neil died from complications from a urinary tract blockage, an easily treatable condition. Just months earlier, the Beagleys’ 15-month-old granddaughter died of pneumonia and a blood infection.
Most states have religious exemptions to child abuse laws. Oregon law formerly provided some protection to parents who relied solely on spiritual treatment for their dying child. The protection was withdrawn in 1999 amid cases of children from Followers of Christ Church dying from untreated medical conditions.
The Beagleys may face 16 to 18 months in prison.
Some would say that this indicates that prayer does not work.
In this instance, prayer did not work. The Beagleys’ prayers also failed for their granddaughter a few months ago, and as the article notes, Oregon removed child abuse protections for faith healing families following a number of cases of their church’s children dying.
This seems like a clear-cut case of a cult which promotes false teachings, and whose followers do not have the ear of God.
A parody site has sprung up to mock their failed faith:
http://www.followersofchristchurch.com/
Come Join Us!*
We are always looking for (healthy) new members to join our flock.
Since insuring our youngest members make it to adulthood is not a priority of ours, we must look outside our congregation to grow. Oh woopsie, we just lost another member: a 16 yr. old boy. Please hurry!
The church does not appear to have a website of its own. However, it seems their faith has been weak for years:
[March 31, 2008] 15-month-old Ava Worthington [the Beagleys' granddaughter mentioned above - Matt] died at her Oregon City home on March 2nd of pneumonia and a blood infection.
Until this month, it had been many years since the “Followers of Christ Church” had lost a child to sickness. Sunday, parishioners declined to discuss their faith healing practices and religious beliefs with KGW.
Ten years ago, several children from the same church died from untreated medical conditions like diabetes.
Here’s what the medical examiner told KGW reporter Pat Doris back in 1998: “It’s an awful way to die, little Bo Phillips is not the only one. We’ve had 3 cases in the past 9 months out here. Some have been lingering, horrible, painful deaths, all of them unnecessary deaths”, said Larry Lewman, a former state medical examiner.
This is what spurred Oregon to remove protection for faith healing families in 1999 . . . the failed faith of a cult, not the failures of God.
Doesn’t the failure of a prayer always indicate the failure of God?
So, by your hypothesis, the fact that their prayers/healings had failed before means that their faith was to blame? That doesn’t feel right. How does the lack of healings in the past indicate the failure of the parishoners, rather than the failure of God?
In any case, many states do not allow for this kind of behavior; I have first hand experience (My father is neonatologist, a doctor who specializes in sick and premature infants) and he often has to get a court order to give blood transfusions to infants whose parents are Jehovah’s Witnesses or Christian Scientists.
Hi, and welcome!
That’s a good question. I don’t have the answers; that’s why I started this site. I’m hoping to find some.
I do think that if faith healing is not working, it’s appropriate for the authorities to step in. Clearly, the people praying don’t have God’s ear!
(Assuming He is listening.)
Hi, and thanks ^^
I seem to think that faith healing is a crock, and that authorities should always step in, but I don’t think that proper studies have been done. The one study I am aware of, at least in terms of large, long term prayers with proper blinds, resulted in a negative influence; the people who knew they were being prayed for actually fared less than the people who didn’t, and the people where were prayed for without their knowledge did no better than the control.
We’ve got a few studies referenced in the Library section. I wrote a post about them a couple of weeks ago. Two of the studies were with born-again Christians and demonstrated statistically-significant success; the other one was much larger, but was with catholics and “spiritual” people and did not have success but, as you note, a negative influence.
Does this mean that God isn’t listening, or that God only listens to certain people?