Scrolls of Prayer Research

WHY a blog on       

Scrolls of Prayer Research?

As a professor of communication (note that the views expressed herein do not necessarily reflect those of Old Dominion University where i am employed), I’ve been immersed in prayer research from 1995-2016, and now in my late 50’s, I’m concerned that my mortality will prevent me from completing all the prayer projects I planned…one of my undergraduate students, Kyle Williams once remarked (paraphrasing),

“Dr. B, you don’t have to do it all…you can orchestrate the prayer research…others will follow and eventually carry out the work [bold added].”

At the time I felt a sense of relief, but now, several years later, I feel like my efforts to orchestrate the prayer research by spreading the word like: 

             1)  Presenting a plenary session at Southern Communication Association in 2010 entitled
                  “Opening the mind, engaging the body, and igniting the spirit: Prayer as
                   religious/spiritual communication,”

            2)   Reviewing prayer research in three disciplines, providing exemplars from each, and
                  outlining areas for future research published in Communication Review in 2012, and

           3)    Guest editing a special issue on prayer for Journal of Communication and Religion in
                   2013…

all of these efforts has not led to an active legacy of prayer research.

Three years ago (Baesler, 2016, p. 108) I wrote,

“My last endeavor to spread the word about prayer research will be to translate the prayer scrolls (the 100+ prayer research ideas) into a digital format like a blog…where others can view, comment, ask questions, and contribute their own ideas to a growing body of prayer literature [bold added]”

It is time to make good on my promise.

Thus this blog of prayer research ideas based on the prayer scrolls (these scrolls are cheap art paper that hand wrote ideas for prayer research once upon a time and then rolled up and inserted into a two foot red colored drafting tube which stares at me from atop my bookshelf).

I organize the prayer research ideas as a list of related projects, and later I plan to return to flesh them out in more detail as time allows (perhaps on my next sabbatical in three years). At least this effort gets the ideas out there for others to “view, comment, ask questions, and contribute their own” or better yet, to improve on an idea and begin/continue your own prayer research!

                                                       References

Baesler, E. J. (2010). Opening the mind, engaging the body, and igniting the spirit: Prayer as religious/spiritual communication. Plenary presentation given to the Southern States Communication Association, Memphis, TN.

Baesler, E. J. (2012). Prayer research. Review of Communication, 12 (2), 143-158.

Baesler, E. J. (2012). An introduction to prayer research in communication: Functions, contexts, and possibilities. Special Issue of the Journal of Communication and Religion, 35(3), 202-208.
http://digitalcommons.odu.edu/communication_fac_pubs/10

Baesler (2016). Searching for the divine: An autoethnographic account of religious/spiritual
and academic influences on the journey to professor. Journal of Communication and
Religion, 39(4), 92-112.
https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/communication_fac_pubs/17/