A question about prayer, malaria and evolution. Interested?

Question

Sometimes when people put up prayer requests on R&S (which they shouldn't, it's solicitation not a question) for something like a driving test or a sick pet, I ask them if instead they would care to pray to God to eradicate malaria. That's because any god should consider someone's driving test of little importance compared to a vile disease that kills an African child every 30 seconds. I wonder what kind of god puts such a disease on Earth in the first place, and I wonder what kind of people think their driving test is more important, but we'll let that go.

Scientists are on the brink of a scheme to eradicate malaria. They aim to release genetically modified mosquitos into the wild which are immune to the malaria parasite and which are better adapted to survive than malarials ones. This technology is grounded on evolutionary principles first established by Darwin and Mendel. Evoluionary theory in practice is about to defeat malaria where prayer has always failed.

Your thoughts?

The news story:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6468381.stm

Further details:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/gmdebate/Story/0,,2038169,00.html

Answer 1

Hey Bad Liberal, excellent question, now I have two points for you to ponder.
It is true that scientists are on the brink of eradicating malaria. They want to release DDT into the water (which would not harm humans in any way) and thus kill off the mosquito population. Thus we would save millions of human lives. But guess what? The environmental LIBERALS won't let them do it. They say DDT is bad for the environment (based off some faulty and old studies done in the 70s) and some of them even claim that the mosquitoes have just as much right to life as the baby dying of malaria.

What a bunch of rubbish, eh? Does it make you want to change your name?

Now onto my second point. Your fault is that you have assumed human qualities onto an inhuman God. You figure that God, like humans, has only a finite capacity for understanding and memory, and thus we should only trouble said "God" with the BIG stuff, like malaria, and leave the driving tests to ourselves.
The more you study the Bible however, the more you will learn that God is a mega and major MICRO-manager. He wants to be in charge of every aspect of your life. The Bible says God knows the number of hairs on your head, it says not a bird falls from a tree without Him knowing about it, etc etc. God is not human. He is better; He is God. He wants us to communicate with Him about everything, because the more we pray the closer we draw to Him.
To answer your question directly, I do pray for malaria victims. One of my professors in college had malaria. I also pray for little things, like a parking hole when I pull into the truck stop. It's okay, God can handle it. He's not so small as to be too "busy" for us.
Bless you! :) Now have a cookie, oatmeal raisin, made um myself.

Answer 2

Maybe not enough believers slaughtered lambs at the alter before praying to have malaria wiped out.

As for the driving test, they're all so obsessed with the idea that everything that happens to someone else is part of God's plan that should not be questioned. But of course God will be prepared to listen to THEIR prayers, and change his plan to allow for passing that driving test.........as long as you go to the right christian church out of the hundreds to chose from.

Answer 3

does prayer really work the same as it did in the Old testament?
i ask this because those people would put up altars and do a sacrifice and the Lord was pleased.
I know the Jews are breeding livestock for sacrifice as we speak by the temple mount.
So is praying really enough for God to listen, or should we put effort into pleasing him with the sweet smell of burning flesh for him to answer prayers, cause back then, he would answer you and you could speak with him, nowadays, when you pray, all you can do is wait and hope he got it.

Answer 4

Yes, very interested. That's wonderful news.

But you're going to get yourself in trouble, not just for the "promotion" of evolution, but you've mentioned that other taboo subject, genetic modification. Hey, why haven't we had fights over that one? - surely there are web-sites "debunking" GM that can be cut and pasted from by now...

Answer 5

Prayer always fails. Period.
Science on the other hand, sometimes fails, but mostly succeeds. That is how Science trumps prayer and religion time and time again.

Answer 6

You are absolutely right. But Christians have had 2,000 years to come up with an apologia to suit any imaginable challenge to their Flintstones worldview.

Answer 7

WE NEED A NEW KINGDOM THAT GOD IS THE RULER...THEOCRACY KIND OF GOVERNMENT AND ALL YOUR QUESTIONS WILL BE ANSWERED.