Christian Pastor Youcef Nadarkhani has been released from prison in Iran, after having his blasphemy charge reduced to "evangelizing to Muslims". The punishment for this lower crime is 3 years in prison. Since he had already served three years, he was released.
In reading the comments on the "Free Pastor Yousef Nadarkhani" facebook page, I am shocked at the amount of cognitive dissonance required for the commenters to believe that prayer made a difference. I stirred quite a controversy when I posted that I hadn't prayed for the pastor, but instead wrote letters to my congressional representatives and spread the word by talking to friends about his ordeal. Apparently religious people consider praying for a person in distress more important than taking concrete steps to help the person.
This is how I see it: If you're drowning, do you want spectators to pray for you? Or would you prefer that someone throws you a life preserver, or jumps in to help you? My answer is, stop praying and start doing!
I don't intend to disrespect those believers who whole heartedly believe that prayer works miracles. I won't even be an annoying atheist and ask for proof. I will ask believers to consider this: Is it enough to pray, or should the prayer be followed up with action. In my (not so) humble opinion, prayer should always be followed up by some kind of action.
I also want to point out to my religious friends that Pastor Naderkhani's ordeal perfectly illustrates the twin problems of religious fundamentalism and the mixing of religion and government. No one should ever be persecuted for their beliefs (or lack of belief). It is a matter of human dignity. If we wish to protect ourselves from persecution, we should support and promote tolerant secularism as a cultural and national element.
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