GENS4010 Week 9 & 10

I've merged weeks 9 and 10 together because I think prayers and miracles are closely connected. After all, what some people ask for through prayers are miracles.

Prayer

I think prayers have been traditionally associated with paying respects to God, at least in Christianity sense. But increasingly more and more people treat prayers as simply a way to communicate, or in other religions, simply to meditate. I can really relate this to myself, as I often speak to myself to recollect my thoughts, or try to do some constructive thinking. Praying to God in a conversation style would probably take a similar form, with the exception that you're talking to your deity, and not to yourself.

I also think that talking with God is largely psychological, because you're never talking with Him, but rather talking to Him. When I used to pray, I sometimes received this warm, fuzzy feeling inside which made me feel good, and reassured myself that He is out there listening. But now, I believe such feelings were roused through my thoughts rather than by divine presence.

But like I said above, I think when praying treated the same way as talking to yourself, it is a great way to recollect your thoughts and organise your mind, and perhaps a good way to mediate as well.

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Miracles

Similar to prayers, I do believe that miracles are largely psychological too, unless they're events of which are so obviously divine it its nature that it casts no doubt as to the involve of God. Such events of epic proportions that break the laws of physics and science are recorded in the Bible, such as Jesus walking over water, Moses dividing the Red Sea, columes of fire and smoke erupting from the ground to the sky, et cetera.

I recently got involved in a discussion with a friend about Christianity, and she being a dedicated Christian, I asked her how come such miracles of biblical scale happened before in biblical times but not anymore (at least in the relatively modern times of recorded history). Her answer was that she wasn't sure why, but she implied that just because we're not aware of such miracles does not mean that they do not happen.

I feel that smaller miracles that are mostly coincidental in nature like the rain suddenly stopping when you need to go out or the bus running late when you arrive at the bus stop late are simply that - coincidences. When such coincidences occurs, it just feels good, and people including myself want to thank something for it. If that happens to be God, then that's fine by me. I personally feel that these coincidental miracles are simply timely incidences that makes us feel lucky, which gives a feeling that it was a divine intervention by higher powers.

Something that I heard endearing from the movie Bruce Almight is that people should not expect miracles, but rather try to be miracles. A single mother with two job who has time to take her son to the football match is a miracle. I think this statement is something that we should all strive to achieve.