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Office of Prayer ResearchSM to provide safe haven for spiritual, scientific collaboration
BARCELONA, Spain – Offering an olive branch in an age-old conflict, Unity, a worldwide spiritual resource affiliated with more than 900 churches, today announced an initiative that will help bring together science and spirituality.
Unity, which places prayer at the core of its belief, used the occasion of the opening day of the Parliament of the World’s Religions to announce the establishment of the Office of Prayer ResearchSM. Dr. Deepak Chopra, author of more than 36 books, participated in Unity’s Parliament Program and announcement.
The mission of the Office of Prayer ResearchSM will be to advance scientific research on the effects of prayer and to serve as a conduit for the exchange of information coming from the scores of prayer studies scientists conduct each year in the U.S. and throughout the world.
An estimated 12,000 delegates representing religions from 80 countries are attending the Parliament of the World’s Religions this week. The Parliament began in 1893 and is dedicated to cultivating harmony between the world's religious and spiritual communities. Unity President Tom Zender unveiled the Office of Prayer ResearchSM to the international gathering.
“Throughout history, when science and religion have come together, there has typically been more clash than collaboration. Copernicus, for instance, believed he had proof that the sun was at the center of the universe, but had one of his students publish the first thesis for fear that if he did so, he would suffer the retribution of the church,” said Tom Zender. “More recently, people of science and spirituality have become like casual acquaintances – they acknowledge each other with a nod, but rarely shake hands or engage in dialogue.”
“The Office of Prayer ResearchSM will give men and women of science and spirituality a place to go and shake hands and pursue possibilities together. Together we will work toward a common goal – learning more about the power of prayer,” Zender said.
“Even though prayer has existed in every spiritual tradition, only recently has science begun to validate that prayer ‘works,’ which in the field of medicine means that patients who are prayed over recover faster and have fewer complications from serious illness. But science is at a loss over why prayer works, and it will remain at a loss until we revise our most basic theories of what we call reality,” said Chopra.
For more than 100 years, Unity’s transdenominational prayer ministry, Silent Unity, has provided prayer support for people of all faiths. Silent Unity receives more than 2 million prayer requests per year. The Office of Prayer ResearchSM will be located at Unity’s worldwide headquarters in Unity Village, Mo., just outside Kansas City, Mo., U.S.A.
Dr. Mitch Krucoff, of Duke University Medical Center, and Dr. Jeffrey Dusek, of Harvard Medical School, were both in Barcelona to participate in a Unity presentation where the announcement was made. Krucoff is renowned for his writings and research on spirituality and medicine and was the principal investigator of Duke’s groundbreaking MANTRA prayer study. The MANTRA study was important because, of all patients tested, the lowest absolute patient complications were observed in patients assigned to offsite prayer. These results were significant enough to indicate that further study was needed. Dusek was the principal researcher of Harvard’s Study of the Therapeutic Effects of Intercessory Prayers (STEP).
"Unity's outreach to the scientific community through this Office of Prayer Research is really quite welcome," said Krucoff. "The establishment of the Office of Prayer Research demonstrates both great respect for research science and profound conviction in Unity's own beliefs. With the Office of Prayer Research, Unity is not only encouraging scientists to collect all the empirical data they can, Unity is also offering to help amass and disseminate these data for the advancement of further research."
Unity named Bob Barth as director of the Office of Prayer ResearchSM. Barth, who also serves as Unity’s vice president and spiritual director, was previously the vice president for Unity School for Religious Studies (now Unity Institute). Barth, in addition to being an ordained Unity minister, holds a degree in physics with a minor in mathematics from Gonzaga University in Spokane, Wash.
“Having long appreciated the peaceful and positive co-existence of science and spirituality in my own life, I am thrilled to take on this role in my professional life,” said Barth. “The Office of Prayer ResearchSM
is in its infancy, but we expect it to mature quickly.”
Barth said that as data is assembled, the Office of Prayer ResearchSM will become a clearinghouse for facts on valid scientific research on prayer, no matter what the results. “It is our goal that everyone who is interested – scientists, spiritual seekers, the media – will soon see the Office of Prayer ResearchSM
and www.officeofprayerresearch.org as their first and best source for information,” Barth said.
According to Barth, the Office of Prayer ResearchSM plans to conduct a global public survey to define and measure the world’s prayer-related behaviors and beliefs. “We want to gain a better understanding of humanity's relationship with prayer,” he said.
The Office of Prayer ResearchSM will also explore funding mechanisms that could be used to advance further prayer research.
Working with research scientists is not new for Unity. In 1998, Harvard Medical School turned to Silent Unity, the prayer ministry of Unity, as a source for its STEP study. In 2001, Duke University Medical Center released results of another study Unity participated in – Dr. Krucoff’s MANTRA (Monitoring and Actualization of Noetic Training) Study. According to Krucoff, results from that study “further suggest that using rigorous scientific methods to study the therapeutic value of prayer … appears feasible and warrants larger-scale, more definitive investigations.”
In recent years, the scientific and medical communities have become increasingly interested in the relationship between prayer and healing. Many medical schools now offer specific courses in spirituality or are incorporating the theme into the curriculum. By some estimates, more than 350 prayer studies have already been conducted in the U.S.
“We have witnessed a recent shift in the medical profession’s willingness to discuss and research this topic,” said Barth. “It’s a trend the Office of Prayer ResearchSM hopes to foster.”
According to Zender, affirmative prayer has been the cornerstone of work at Unity for 115 years.
“With the Office of Prayer ResearchSM, Unity has the opportunity to walk the talk on a whole new level,” said Zender. “We have a chance to make a significant contribution toward mankind’s understanding of the power of prayer.”
A transdenominational organization, Unity is dedicated to supporting people of all faiths on their spiritual journeys and to helping them apply positive spiritual principles in their daily lives. Unity is on the Internet at www.unityonline.org. Unity helps people use the power of affirmative prayer through its prayer ministry, Silent Unity, which receives two million prayer requests each year. Unity also publishes Daily Word, an inspirational magazine circulated in approximately 175 countries around the world. Unity’s world headquarters is located at Unity Village, 15 miles southeast of downtown Kansas City, Missouri.
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