Christian Educators’ Use of Prayer to Cope with Stress

Teachers experience significant work-related stress, and research asserts that they show greater mental health symptoms associated with this stress as compared to many other professions. Psychological distress among educators has been reported in the literature to be twice that of the general population. In other lines of research examining religious practices such as prayer, researchers have documented the overall positive impact of prayer on one’s mental health. This study identified sources of stress for an international sample of 916 Christian educators, and the use of religious practices such as prayer, to determine whether prayer served as a coping strategy for their work-related stress. A mixed methods approach was used to measure three key variables: sources of stress, spiritual practices, and job satisfaction. Qualitative findings were used to analyze participants’ sources of stress, and quantitative findings were used to measure their practice of spiritual disciplines and job satisfaction. A statistically significant relationship was found between frequency of prayer and job satisfaction, providing support for the initial hypothesis.