It seems my recent post regarding Ignorance & Absurdity struck a nerve with Mr Derrick Thomas Thiessen. Mr Thiessen (who recently confessed that his refusal to use my name or link to my site is motivated by pettiness and cowardice) was upset by my words, and wrote up a lengthy rant that repeated debunked claims around the medical profession, and faith healing as well.
Once up a time, Mr Thiessen and I had a debate on faith healing, some ten years ago now. He managed to mangle science and reason back then, and his latest post is no different. I am not going to waste my time with a point-by-point takedown of his post, so instead, I shall link to an old post of mine, as well as an old post from my buddy Bruce Gerencser, who provided a similar takedown of the ludicrous concept of faith healing.
To be clear, I have no problem whatsoever with someone choosing to pray alongside seeking out medical treatment. I do not care what you do to find comfort in challenging times, providing you are not hurting anyone else. Ultimately, as adults we are free to make our own choices and if as an adult, you choose to exclusively rely on faith healing and the power of prayer to heal yourself, that’s up to you, as are the consequences.
The big problem I have is when parents and guardians turn to faith healing to try and cure children of illnesses, injuries and problems, and don’t take them to see a doctor. There are numerous cases of children left with life-long issues because their parents refused to seek out proven conventional medical care. There are numerous cases of children dying as a result of such neglect.
What Mr Thiessen – and others like him – will do is brush this aside. It doesn’t matter that the available evidence suggests faith healing has a much higher rate of failure than conventional medical treatment. They point to the numbers without applying context, and refuse to understand how percentages work (perhaps they are incapable of doing so, and too embarrassed to admit it).
There’s plenty of information out there via the links I provided, and more if you are willing to look. I will leave you with some stories, written by people with direct experience of faith healing, and invite anyone reading to stop and seriously consider the human cost of ignoring medical guidance. I also invite readers to ask why faith healers are not subject to the same scrutiny as qualified medical professionals. Why are faith healers shielded from the consequences of their failures?
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