“The prayers of others helped”: Intercessory prayer as a source of coping and resilience in Christian African American families

ABSTRACT

Married African American families are perceived as highly religious; however, they are often underrepresented in research studies involving prayer. This study used qualitative interviews to examine intercessory prayer as a perceived source of strength and resilience for 33 heterosexual, highly religious African American families identifying as Christian. Data were analyzed using open coding and Numeric Content Analysis. The following themes were identified: (a) Interceding Prayers Build Personal Strength, (b) Interceding Prayers Strengthen Marital Bonds, and (c) Interceding Prayers Unite Communities. Narratives are offered to support each theme and social work implications are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• prayer
• intercessory prayer
• marriage
• African American
• religion
• coping

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Although some scholars advocate for individual interviews, several others recognize that joint interviews can provide a rich context for learning about relationships and experiences through verbal and nonverbal interactions (Bjornholt & Farstad, 2014; Lambert & Dollahite, 2006). Recognizing both sides of these arguments, we encouraged the couples to add to the other’s response, and we provided each spouse the opportunity to respond first to alternating questions. Further, given the average length of marriage for these couples, there was nothing to suggest that our preferred method of coupled interviews would contribute to dishonest responses from either the husband or the wife.