Faith Healings

[Sminty_Smeagol]

I was watching Ernest Angley on television today. For the uninformed, Ernest Angley is an evangelist/preacher with a television show/session that comes on from time to time in which he practices 'faith healing', where the physically ailing, injured or disabled come up onto the stage and he puts his hands on them/ sticks his fingers in their ears (in the case of the deaf) etc, does a prayer for healing from 'jesus' and then proceeds to bop them on the forhead, causing them to fall backward into the arms of ushers. He has some money shpeels where he encourages donations. My parents are extreme skeptics of the show, believing him to be blasphemous, and I am not sure. Are 'faith healers' hypnotists whose healing effects are a placebo effect? Or do you believe these people somehow actually have the ability to heal? Religious and nonreligious viewpoints appreciated. We noticed that his show was on at 11 am, when regular churchgoers would probably be at church.