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Assignment 2: Faith Healing.
Cullen Smith
Working Alone

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This is a website promoting faith healing, and connecting the process of faith healing to the bible. This site uses various bible versus to justify their reason for believing in faith healing. For people who are catholic, this could be a huge reason for belief. They are taking the things that you already believe in and using them to gain your belief into the topic of faith healing.

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Faith Healing - The Need
When people are faced with a serious or debilitating illness, they often consider supernatural healing or faith healing as the final option. Our expectations for divine healing are often placed in a variety of sources which present themselves as the only hope for a miraculous recovery. Some individuals will pursue the avenue of faith healers or those professing to have an "ability to heal." Objects such as handkerchiefs, religious icons, or pilgrimages to holy sites are said to offer hope to those in desperate circumstances.

When faced with intense suffering, we may even be tempted to doubt the character of God. "Why is my pain unending and my wound grievous and incurable? Will you be to me like a deceptive brook, like a spring that fails?" (Jeremiah 15:18).

Others try to encourage us by confirming that "all things work together for good to those who love God" (Romans 8:28). Yet our suffering presents our greatest challenge to our faith. At some point we may even blame God for allowing our pain to continue. Or we may ask ourselves, "How much more faith do I need to be healed?"

Faith Healing - The Lesson
Our physical and emotional suffering is magnified when we fail to see any possible good resulting from our sickness. When we concentrate on what God can do through our illness, it keep us focused on God, instead of our difficult circumstances. Shortly after I first met Melanie, she invited me to dinner. Melanie has diabetes which has affected her eyesight and her mobility. Over our 10-year friendship, I've watched her bring comfort to others with her baskets, filled with their customized contents. "I used to be able to get these done in one or two days, but I guess I'm slowing down a little," she says with a twinkle in her eye. "God never rushes anything so I've learned to work at His pace." There are days when I know Melanie's swollen limbs hurt and she pauses for a moment, leaning against a pew to catch her breath. It would be easy for her to pick a seat near the back of the church. But then she'll see a visitor or a person who needs an encouraging word and off she goes to plant herself next to them.

Like Jesus, Melanie loves reaching out to people. Both are well acquainted with pain and suffering. She was injured in two separate car accidents in which five of her seven siblings were killed. Melanie understands emotional and physical pain that doesn't dissipate. Yet she reminds me, "It was good for me to be afflicted so that I might learn [God's] decrees" (Psalm 119:71). Melanie treats each day as a learning process and her afflictions as her greatest teacher.

Faith Healing - The End Result
Healing is an act of unmerited mercy from a sovereign God. We do not put faith in faith itself (or men or objects), but rather in the grace and mercy of Jahveh-Ropheka, "God the Healer." There is no doubt that Jesus cares deeply for us -- He suffered and died so that we could live forever in God's love. His healing doesn't follow a process that would seem logical to us. Jesus healed blind eyes by applying mud, made from "divine spittle" (John 9:6-7)! Jesus was often unconventional, raising a dead widow's son out of compassion, not because of her faith (Luke 7:13). Faith is not something we need to "conjure up" in order to be healed. God is ultimately in control of healing. Whatever the outcome, God is always with those who suffer and He understands their every pain and need. The cross reminds us that God always cares. God is offering us a wholeness that is even more perfect than physical or emotional healing. Perfect health is waiting for us in the resurrection. "Therefore, we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all" (2 Corinthians 4:16-17).

Healing Prayers...

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

- We have all sinned and deserve God's judgment. God, the Father, sent His only Son to satisfy that judgment for those who believe in Him. Jesus, the creator and eternal Son of God, who lived a sinless life, loves us so much that He died for our sins, taking the punishment that we deserve, was buried, and rose from the dead according to the Bible. If you truly believe and trust this in your heart, receiving Jesus alone as your Savior, declaring, " Jesus is Lord," you will be saved from judgment and spend eternity with God in heaven.

What is your response?

Yes, today I am deciding to follow Jesus

Yes, I am already a follower of Jesus

I still have questions

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Faith Healing - The Need When people are faced with a serious or debilitating illness, they often consider supernatural healing or faith healing as the final option. Our expectations for divine healing are often placed in a variety of sources which present themselves as the only hope for a miraculous recovery.

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This is a video about a girl named Emily who visits a faith healer with the hope of curing her cerebral palsy. In the end, his faith healing does not work for her, but what he does to diffuse the situation is emphasise all of the hits and quickly skip over the misses. He avoids confronting the cases that don't work and uses a red herring to distract people from what actually happened

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Can A Faith Healer Make Me Walk Again? | Extraordinary Bodies

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This is a photo of John Mellor, who was the star of the video in my previous post. He claims to be a faith healer. When "healing" he becomes very theatrical. Like he is putting on a show. This helps distract people fro the fact that is doesn't always work and when it does work there is no proof that were were even injured or sick to begin with. This goes back the the red flag of a Red Herring. He s using theatrics to distract people from the problem at hand.

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This article describes faith healing as healing through the placebo affect. An effect that i relate to acupuncture and homeopathy. The article argues that the two diseases that were healed (Ringworm and Warts) were healed in a matter of weeks, and for them to heal naturally it would have taken may months.

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In my previous post, I discussed whether antidepressants work mainly via suggestion, or the placebo effect. A placebo resembles faith healing. Yet faith healing is usually considered more a matter of belief in magic and the supernatural rather than confidence in the science of pharmacology.

From a scientific perspective, faith healing is unexplained, incomprehensible, and should not work. Yet it does work. The same is true of drug placebo effects, of course. Scientists recognize that there are placebo effects but have trouble accounting for them.

If you grew up in a superstitious country, chances are you experienced faith healing. Here are some examples from my own childhood in Ireland:

Children born after their father's death were understood to have the cure for thrush, a throat infection.

The seventh son of a seventh son had special powers, such as the ability to cure ringworm.

A cure for warts was inherited in some families.

Such traditional faith healers generally practiced for free, although strangers might wish to compensate them for their inconvenience with a small gift. Given that these services were genuinely free, and given that faith healers considered it immoral to demand payment for their special gift, they were widely used. What of the results?

The proof of the pudding
One year, my sisters and myself became infected with ringworm - a fungal infection that may be acquired from contact with farm animals. The man with the cure was a local bachelor farmer who could be encountered early in the morning harvesting mushrooms in our pasture. He welcomed us to his cottage and treated our ringworm by drawing a wedding ring across each lesion, making the sign of the cross. "They should be gone in a month," he said. Sure enough, all disappeared in about three weeks.

A close friend had a similar experience with warts. The faith healer knotted pieces of knitting wool above each wart, without touching it, while reciting a Hail Mary. The warts fell off within a month.

Most scientists cope with such evidence through simple skepticism. Perhaps the ostensible "cure" had no connection with the outcome. Without treatment, the time course of recovery would be exactly the same. It is certainly true that ringworm undergoes spontaneous healing. This is a seasonal phenomenon, however with the rash characteristically flourishing during wet, or humid, seasons and spontaneous recovery would have required several months, not a few weeks.

The girl had also had her warts for at least two years, so that their accidental recovery in a month was even more unlikely.

It is always hard to make much sense of such anecdotal phenomena to the satisfaction of scientists but faith healing seems to evoke a placebo effect, not unlike the use of drugs to treat people who are mildly depressed (and therefore experience no true pharmacological response to the medicine).

When people receive a prescription drug, such as Zoloft, or Paxil, they expect improvement and are fair game for a strong placebo response. Why should recipients of faith healing expect to get better? Several elements of the situation conspire to give patients the expectation that they will get better.

To begin with, there is the mumbo jumbo about which individuals acquire the gift to heal a specific malady. Notice how the pagan aspects of faith healing, or "superstition" are combined with Christianity so as to convey the impression that different supernatural forces are working on the problem. Social pressure might also be a factor as we feel pressure to believe in the cure after the manner of The Emperor's New Clothes.

If there is a history of successful outcomes, then people who consult the faith healer are likely to show up because they already have a positive expectation of cure, even if they consider themselves too sophisticated to be taken in by magical thinking.

By means unknown, faith healing is evidently capable of boosting immune function. This would explain why minor lesions clear up faster than would otherwise be the case. If placebos account for half of the effects of non surgical medicine (which may be too conservative) faith healing may be a trillion-dollar industry in the U.S..

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Faith Healing Shouldn't Work, but It Does

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In my previous post, I discussed whether antidepressants work mainly via suggestion, or the placebo effect. A placebo resembles faith healing. Yet faith healing is usually considered more a matter of belief in magic and the supernatural rather than confidence in the science of pharmacology.

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This video explains some of the tricks faith healers use to convince the audience of their legitimacy. Although faith healers claim to just love helping people, there is a tangible motive there for them. And that is money. People pay to see them and people pay to be healed. Therefore if people don't believe in that they're doing, there profit is gone. And they can no longer faith heal, or provide for themselves.

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Faith Healers Tricks Exposed! - Miracles For Sale

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This picture pokes fun at the topic of faith healing. It touches on the red flag appeal to authority. Jesus is one of the most famous figures on the planet. And putting his name/face on anything can make certain people believe enough to not look at the facts.

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This article here talks about Peter Popoff. It talks about a topic that we touched on in one of the lessons. When skeptic James Randi debunked him and proved that we is a fraud, soon after that Peter filed for bankruptcy. But not long after that, the article says that he was back and earning $24 million a year. This is a perfect case of emotional connection. When people are under the influence of strong emotions they are easily influenced.

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If you've ever channel surfed late into the night, you've probably seen Peter Popoff. He's a televangelist who looks the part, with hair the color of black shoe polish, teeth as white as light bulbs, and a voice that manages to be screeching, nasal and guttural at the same time.
"God is touching hurting people around the world," Popoff says in a recent video on his website, sitting in a wingback chair beside his wife, Elizabeth. "It's always such a joy to share the reality of that joy. It's a joy to share the reality of his saving power, healing power, delivery power, and ... debt cancelling power! Amen!"

Popoff has been a preacher for over three decades. While the specifics change over time, Popoff's basic message remains largely the same: that God wants us to be affluent and debt-free, and that Popoff is a prophet sent by God to help people transform their lives from poverty to affluence.

[Infographic: What to do if a Debt Collector Calls]

"Debt cancellation is part of God's plan," Popoff says in the video posted to his website, as a little dog sleeps in his lap. "That's why God sent me to you. How would you ever know about miraculous debt cancellation, erasure of your debts if someone didn't tell you about it?"

Another thing that remains consistent: Multiple times throughout his career, Popoff has been exposed as a fraud. The first big revelation happened on the Johnny Carson show in 1986, where the magician James Randi played secret audiotapes revealing Popoff's scam as a faith healer. Before every revival event Popoff led, Popoff's staff and his wife Elizabeth would interview audience members about their health problems., and they would collect prayer cards from the audience. As Peter worked the room, his wife would point out vulnerable people for him to approach, and tell him about their physical ailments, via a small radio receiver stuck in Popoff's ear.

[Resource: Get your free Credit Report Card]

Not long after that show aired, Popoff declared bankruptcy. But the setback proved temporary. Popoff started over, and by 2005 his "ministry" was earning more than $24 million a year.

If anything about Popoff is truly miraculous, it's his resilience. No matter how many times his claims are debunked, he seems to bounce back with another version of the same old scam. Popoff has promised to cancel peoples' debts using holy water and blessed oil. He has claimed to be a prophet who can heal peoples' illnesses by slapping them on the head. He promises to use God's power to help people become rich.

These claims have been exposed as falsehoods many times. After the Johnny Carson debacle, Popoff has been tailed by everyone from Inside Edition to local TV news stations from Los Angeles to Atlanta. After each investigation, Popoff seems to bounce back, launching new crusades and finding new victims.

"We've done so many stories about him, but it never does any good," says Ole Anthony, founder of Trinity Foundation, which has investigated Popoff and other faith healers since 1987. "His scams are endless."

Credit.com called and emailed Peter Popoff Ministries numerous times, but received no response. So we decided to run a little test ourselves. In the process we discovered that Popoff's biggest scam doesn't happen on television; it's carried out through the mail.

Fat Envelopes, Big Promises

Apparently God wants me-yes me!-to be free of debt. In a rambling five-page letter, Peter Popoff tells me that God has instructed him to stop touring the nation and devote all his energy to erasing my debt.

And now God wants me to do the same.

"It's time for you, Chris, to shift gears and enter into this whole new phase of Miracle living," Popoff writes in his letter.

I first discovered Peter Popoff by way of Steve Rhode, a personal finance expert who calls himself the " Get Out of Debt Guy." Back when Steve wrote about Popoff earlier this year, the televangelist was still mailing out vials of blessed holy water, and advising viewers of BET that the water had the power to erase their debt.

[Article: Student Loans Top Consumer Debt]

"We're anointed and appointed to get you healthy and wealthy," Popoff said in the broadcast, which you can find saved on Rhode's website.

"Let us send you this miracle faith tool to erase your debt. And we also want to send you this miracle faith water."

As a guy who writes about debt for a living, I was more than a little curious to get my hands on this water. And if Popoff turned out to be a fraud, which I was pretty sure he would, then maybe I can help more people from becoming victims.

But before writing him off as a con man, first needed to give Popoff's system an honest try. After all, if Popoff and God actually are working together to cancel debts, then presumably their system should work even for me, a preternaturally disbelieving journalist.

So I started by going to the website for Peter Popoff Ministries. There I filled out a form requesting a "Miracle Spring Water and Debt Cancelling Kit," giving Popoff my name and address. I also called the phone number on the website. I left messages identifying myself as a journalist and asking Popoff or one of his employees to call me back. No one did.

And then I waited. And waited. I thought perhaps my call informing the organization that I'm a journalist might have caused them to block my request for a debt cancellation kit, since they surely would suspect that a journalist would be trying to investigate them, not send them money.

But my fears were unnecessary. After about two and a half months, a fat envelope from Peter Popoff Ministries appeared in my mailbox, with the words "How to Supernaturally erase YOUR DEBT!!" written in green ink across the front.

I tore into the envelope hoping to find some spring water. I was immediately disappointed. Instead of a vial of water, I received a rambling five-page letter. It immediately became clear that this process of getting my debts "supernaturally erased" is quite complicated. The letter included a long list of instructions, which I attempted to follow. First I added up all my debts from graduate school and my credit card. I placed the tally, the bills and my checkbook in a pile.

Do Not Open This Envelope

On top of the pile, Popoff instructed, I should place a sealed envelope that he'd mailed me. On the back was a picture of Jesus, plus this warning: "IN JESUS' NAME... DO NOT OPEN THIS ENVELOPE YOU may STOP YOUR BLESSING," Popoff had written across the back.

Here, dear reader, I experienced a dilemma. On one hand, I wanted to follow Popoff's instructions exactly, giving his debt cure the best possible chance of success. On the other hand, I felt a responsibility to tell you everything I could about this alleged scam.

In the end, journalistic integrity beat out spiritual rectitude. I opened the envelope. Inside was a white eraser about the length of my thumb, with the image of a $100 bill printed on one side. The good news is that opening the letter does not necessarily eliminate me from God's debt-cancelling grace, according to Popoff. "If you have opened it...seal it back up and don't think about what's inside," he writes. "Just know God is going to use it to erase your debt, and I'll answer you with special scriptural instructions to do so."

[Article: To Save or Pay Down Debt? Budget for Both]

Phew!

With the envelope tightly resealed and placed upon my pile of debts, I went to sleep. In the morning I filled out a "prayer slip" that contained a grid of 10 "troubles" I may have in addition to debt. Popoff promised to pray over these troubles, too. I checked off seven, as instructed, including "I need stronger faith" and "A person causes me trouble."

Finally, I wrote Popoff a check for $20. This was optional. As Popoff explains in his letter, "Now, listen, if there is no way you can send that amount now ... send $12 and let me know you'll send the rest when God provides."

I figured now was not the time to cheap out. I stuffed the prayer slip and a check for $20 into an envelope and mailed it all to Peter Popoff Ministries in Upland, California. Popoff promised to place my envelope on his prayer altar. After that, he would mail me another letter with instructions regarding "THE EXACT WORDS TO SAY...TO RELEASE THE ANGELS TO MINISTER FOR YOU TO CANCEL DEBT..."

[Free Tool: Obtain your Identity Risk Score from Credit.com]

I received the second letter about two weeks later. The instructions for supernatural debt cancellation came, strangely, on a yellow paper napkin. Beneath the printed words was a line drawing of Jesus with his hands outstretched.

I did as I was told. I placed my right hand over Jesus's right hand. And then I recited this awkward prayer:

"Dear Jesus, As I follow these prophetic instructions release your DOUBLE PORTION ANOINTING into the circumstances of my life...I claim a DOUBLE PORTION Transfer of the anointing into my Health, Finance, Spiritual walk in Jesus' Name!"

I waited a few days to give the prayer time to work. Then I went online and checked my credit card and student loan accounts. Neither had been erased, supernaturally or otherwise. My Visa actually bill was actually a little higher, thanks to a really tasty Vietnamese dinner I'd charged the night before.

The biggest change: Thanks to Peter Popoff, I was $20 poorer.

The Business of Salvation

I got off easy, of course. Janet Morgano was a single mother of two living in Boynton Beach, Florida. She was taken in by Popoff's claims of debt cancellation, initially sending him between $20 and $30 at a time.

Then, in late 2010, Popoff sent a letter asking for $1,001. Morgano wound up mailing him over $300, money she desperately needed as she struggled to recover from a car accident and pay her monthly bills.

"I felt foolish, I felt betrayed, I was very upset," Morgano told a reporter with KABC, the ABC affiliate n Los Angeles.

Other victims have written in web forums, including Christian Issues, edited by Brian Karjala of Colorado Springs, who received a letter from Popoff in 1997. Numerous posters on the site tell of being scammed and warn other Christians to stay away. While most people say they mailed Popoff less than $100, one person writes to say that their father sent $1,000.

[Article: Dealing with Debt While Unemployed]

"He has squeezed some money out of me as well," one person wrote. "Desperate for support from the high, I went along with it because I so badly wanted answers."

Some desperate people must have been conned into mailing Popoff hundreds or even thousands of dollars, as we can infer from his tax returns from 2005. (That's the last year for which tax information is available because in 2006 Peter Popoff Ministries changed from a for-profit business into a religious organization, making it tax-exempt.) The company received $24.5 million in 2005, and it owned properties valued at $5.1 million. The tax forms don't require Popoff to say where he received the money, other than describing the sources as "Contributions, gifts, grants."

Popoff himself took $628,732 in compensation, plus another $48,000 for his role as board member and employee of other related entities. His wife Elizabeth took $202,920. Popoff's son Nickolas received $181,811, and $176,008 went to his daughter Amy.

[Resource: Tips to Improve and Rebuild Your Credit]

Another $1.9 million went to Kelly Media Group of Upland, California, for TV production. Kelly Media is owned by Popoff's son-in-law, Jason Cardiff.

"He's committing fraud in the name of God," says Ole Anthony of the Trinity Foundation. "That's what makes me angry."

An IRS spokesman declined to tell Credit.com whether the agency is investigating Popoff. As a member of the powerful finance committee, Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA) conducted an investigation of six popular televangelists (not including Popoff). After three years of study, Grassley released a report in January that expressed concerns about TV pastors' lavish homes, jet planes and huge credit card expenses, but ultimately failed to reach any conclusions about whether the ministries were in violation of IRS rules. Instead, Grassley called on televangelists to police themselves.

"Self-correction can be more effective than government action," Grassley said in a press release.

"Hook, Line and Sinker"

Popoff's style and approach stand out from his fellow televangelists, partly because his writing and speaking style seem so confusing to first-time viewers. He is often repetitive, and many of his sentences don't make any sense.

"Debt closes churches, and opens people's [sic] lives to more trouble than they can ever deal with in the natural," Popoff wrote in a letter I received.

But underneath this seemingly childish language lies sophisticated psychological manipulation, says D.J. Grothe, director of the James Randi Educational Foundation, which continues to keep tabs on Popoff's activities 25 years after Randi's exposé ran on national television.

[Resource: Bankruptcy Survival Guide]

It starts with all that back-and-forth interaction. Popoff didn't just tell me how to erase my debts; he engaged me in a conversation via the mail, in which I sent him two letters and he responded with two in return. In my case, I received an eraser and a napkin, and was given specific instructions on what to do with them. In the past Popoff has mailed out packets of "Holy Water," which recipients were told to drink, and he's also sent "Anointed Oil" with instructions to drizzle it over tallies of their debts.

This whole convoluted process serves two purposes, Grothe says. First, it enables Popoff to identify people naïve or desperate enough to participate. Second, it turns each interaction into a ritual, deepening victims' psychological attachment to Popoff.

"It's not passive at all," says Grothe. "It's sophisticated psychology designed to find highly bought-in marks, because if you're communicating back with him, it's a good bet that you're already taken hook, line and sinker."

[Featured Tool: Get your free Credit Report Card from Credit.com]

Popoff regularly buys late-night air time on BET and other cable channels. The purpose is not to get people calling in immediately with more donations. Rather, the calls Popoff receives from his television programming are converted into more leads for his mailing list, which is his real moneymaker, Anthony says.

All of which makes Poppoff even more nefarious than other TV preachers, according to his longtime critics.

"Most of these guys are fooled by their own theology," says Anthony, referring to other televangelists he considers scammers, including Joel Osteen and T.D. Jakes. But in the case of Popoff, "He's fundamentally evil. Because he knows he's a con man."

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Scam Everlasting: After 25 Years, Debunked Faith Healer Still Preaching Debt Relief Scam

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If you've ever channel surfed late into the night, you've probably seen Peter Popoff. He's a televangelist who looks the part, with hair the color of black shoe polish, teeth as white as light bulbs, and a voice that manages to be screeching, nasal and guttural at the same time.

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This last video touches on the previous post. Peter Popoff, this video shows how he bounced back after being labelled a fraud in front of the whole world. And people still bought into it, why ? they were following the same motive that he was. Money.

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This photo here relates to the dangers that surround the pseudoscience that is faith healing. When people rely of faith healers to help with their own physical or psychological ailments, they could end up in even more danger or even end up dead. Especially parents that believe that make their kids subjects to faith healing. They are putting another's life at risk because of their own personal beliefs.