From an atheist standpoint there is clearly no point in praying directly to influence the course of external events; atheists can scarcely pray for rain to end a drought and they can scarcely pray for someone's safe return from a journey (however strongly they may hope for a happy outcome).

It might be supposed that since there is, in the atheist's view, no god to pray to, therefore all prayer is futile. But some sorts of prayer can be regarded as coded meditation.

To pray for forgiveness is practically the same as, atheistically, to confront oneself with one's shortcomings and resolve to do better in future - no bad thing to do for anyone of whatever belief or lack of it. Likewise, prayers of thanks for the good things of life are, atheistically speaking, practically the same as reflecting upon one's often undeserved good fortune and caring about the often undeserved misfortunes of others - and, again, that's no bad thing for any of us to do.

There is no atheistic basis for praying to influence external events but believers do so quite frequently; the interesting question is whether believers have any sound basis, in belief, for so doing. I suggest that, as mature believers, they have none.

Statistical studies of the efficacy of prayers, aimed at influencing the course of external events, are quite inconclusive. Such prayers do not, overall, yield results significantly different from what might be the outcome of pure chance.

Indeed there was an interesting letter to The SCOTSMAN just after the Gulf War; the correspondent wrote to the effect that "anyone could tell that the war would break out because there were so many prayers for peace." This does not imply the existence of a perverse god who does the opposite of what is asked. The likely explanation is that the realisation, at the eleventh hour, that war was already inevitable, was precisely the trigger for prayers of sheer desperation; all else had evidently failed. The prayers and the war were the parallel outcomes of the unstoppable drift to war. They were joint effects of the same cause.

But statistical analysis and considerations of cause and effect are, however absorbing, quite beside the theological point.

Whenever we suffer an evidently undeserved misfortune (when bad things happen to good people) believers are likely to tell us that "sadly, what has happened to you is part of God's Plan and it is really all for the best although you, naturally, cannot now see it that way. Trust God; He knows best in ways that we cannot necessarily understand.

'God knows best' is a theory that, by reason of its very construction, can't be proved to be false; technically speaking, it is unfalsifiable; if good things happen then that shows that God is good to us while if bad things happen then that shows how wise God is if we did but understand Him sufficiently. 'God knows best' is at the very centre of theistic belief. But IF God knows best THEN He does not stand in need of our advice as to how events should come to pass.

Prayers designed to persuade God to make events go the way we happen to prefer are founded precisely upon the notion that God does not know best, that He needs our guidance or, alternatively, that He will depart from the perfection of His Plan just to suit us.

This makes God open to our manipulation; this is pure paganism - the notion of the god(s) being on tap. Mature theism, for what it is worth, is precisely that God is not on tap but on top.

Theoogically, the only acceptable prayer in relation to the future course of external events is prayer for strength to cope with whatever it may please God to ask of us. This is practically the same as atheists trying to face whatever the future may hold for them.

Thoughtful prayer and atheistic reflection have more in common than many people think. They are both quite unlike the paganism that is still part of the unthinking believer's folklore.

APOLOGY: It had been intended that this item, AT 3, be published on this site in mid-June but, primarily because of ERIC STOCTON being in hospital for some weeks, publication has been delayed somewhat. It is intended that monthly additions to AT will be made regularly in future.

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