They pray to god asking him to directly intervene and alter a person's life. There is something wrong with you. I shall ask my god to fix you and make you a better person. You should thank me for it. This is one of the reasons that atheists become offended when people say that they will pray for them.
P raying for something to happen is similar.
W hen people pray for something to happen, the way in which they interpret the results can be quite interesting. As an example, I knew a woman who a strong belief in her god, and prayed to him very often. Apart from the obvious question of what the heck is God doing sorting out parking spaces when children are starving to death in Africa, it seems pretty obvious that if you drive around town long enough you are certain to find a space eventually. People count the hits and forget the misses, or even count a miss as a different type of hit - God always answers your prayers, even when it looks like he doesn't. At a zoo in the USA, a small child fell into the gorilla enclosure.