This is embarrassing.

My state is home to the mother church of Christian Science, officially Church of Science, Christ. In what must be considered one of the more bizarre examples of political pork, my state’s Senators, the late Ted Kennedy and John Kerry, have supported a measure sponsored by Orrin Hatch to require health insurance companies to reimburse for Christian Science prayer “treatments.”

According to the LA Times:

The measure would put Christian Science prayer treatments -- which substitute for or supplement medical treatments -- on the same footing as clinical medicine. While not mentioning the church by name, it would prohibit discrimination against "religious and spiritual healthcare."

It would have a minor effect on the overall cost of the bill -- Christian Science is a small church, and the prayer treatments can cost as little as $20 a day. But it has nevertheless stirred an intense controversy over the constitutional separation of church and state, and the possibility that other churches might seek reimbursements for so-called spiritual healing.

It ought to stir intense controversy. At a time when we cannot provide healthcare coverage for millions of Americans, it is unconscionable to consider wasting money on “alternative” health of any kind, whether it is religious or secular.

Amazingly, the payment provision is merely a continuation of special status that has been accorded to Christian Science in the past century.

In the early 20th century, the church sought recognition from state regulators so the practitioners would not be prosecuted for practicing medicine without a license. Criminal courts have convicted Christian Scientists in cases where children have died after visiting prayer healers instead of receiving conventional medical care. The church says no such incidents have occurred for two decades.

About 90 years ago, private insurance companies began paying for Christian Science prayer treatments, but more recently, managed-care insurers declined reimbursements, insisting on paying for care that produced proven medical results.

The Internal Revenue Service allows the cost of the prayer sessions to be counted among itemized medical expenses for income tax purposes -- one of the only religious treatments explicitly identified as deductible by the IRS. Some federal medical insurance programs, including those for military families, also reimburse for prayer treatment.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi stripped a similar measure out of the House healthcare reform bill, accepting arguments of House members that the provision an unconstitutional violation of the separation of Church and State. But equally important is the fact that it violates the express intent of healthcare reform to pay only for treatments that are based on scientific evidence.

The willingness of insurers and the government to tolerate and even fund “alternative” health “treatments” and research has undoubtedly emboldened religious leaders. In the past 10 years the US government has squandered $2.5 billion testing “alternative” health remedies and learning (surprise) that none of them work. With so much money sloshing around to investigate nonsense, why not ask to be reimbursed for providing nonsense?

This proposal to fund prayer as a medical “treatment” is consistent with the willingness to reimburse for “alternative” health. Evidently, the only criterion necessary for reimbursement is the patient’s belief that something works, not scientific evidence that it does actually work.