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In regard
to petitionary prayer, or to petitionary prayer as part of a more comprehensive prayer that includes elements of adoration, expiation, love, and thanksgiving, what determines whether or not God will grant the prayer's request? Can prayer, at times, be
a zero-sum activity? If two people are praying for opposite results (one praying for rain and the other for sunshine, say, or one praying for team A to win its game against team B while the other prays for B to defeat A, or both praying to get the same
job or promotion), how does God decide which to favor? And why, when prayer is not zero-sum, as for example when one prays for the survival of a cancer-stricken friend, does the friend sometimes die anyway? Why, when one prays for the success of
a relationship, or of the relationship of a friend or relative, does the relationship sometimes fail anyway? Why, when one prays for the sake of an investment, does one sometimes get Madoffed anyway? What prerequisites must be met before God will
honor one's pleas? If praying for oneself, how important are the following:
The strength of the prayer's faith in God? The longevity of the prayer's belief in God?
The prayer's history of prayer? The frequency of the prayer's prayers of adoration, expiation, love, and thanksgiving? The frequency of the prayer's petitionary prayers? (Can one be rejected because one is too "needy" and asks too often?
Or does the squeaky wheel get the most grease?) The previous number of times the prayer's prayers have been answered? The good deeds the prayers has done? The sins that the prayer has committed? The love the prayer has for his/her fellow
humans? The extent of the "miracle-working" manipulation of the laws of nature that would be required to answer the prayer? The absolute need of the prayer for the prayer to be answered? (That is, does the prayer sometimes think that the
prayer needs to be answered when, seen from God's ominiscient viewpoint, it actually does not, either because some other positive development is going to supersede it or because granting it would cause unfair harm to others?)
If praying for another, in addition to the above, how important are the following:
The love the prayer has for the prayee? The seriousness
of the prayee's need for the prayer's prayer? The strength of the prayee's faith in God? The importance of the prayee to other people? The importance of the prayee to the world in general? The extent to which the prayee is loved by
others?
Is there a kind of calculus, a mathematical equation in which the negative factors (with some being weighted more heavily--doubled, say, or squared) are subtracted from
the positive factors (with some likewise being weighted more heavily), leading to a figure that would determine whether or not God bestows His grace? Astrophysicists have shown that mathematics underlies the laws of the universe. Is that also true
for the "laws" of petitionary prayer?