So when someone kneels down and prays, saying something like, ‘Dear God...’, does the real God hear him? How does someone distinguish whether they are praying to God or god?
Since “God” is not his name, I believe it is whether or not they are praying to the God of the bible, or some fantasy. If I call my wife, “wife”, I address her correctly. If I call some other personality “Wife”. I’m not.
The God of mormonism is not the one described in the bible. The God of Catholicizm, as best as I can tell, is. That said, not everything we ask for is granted. and many prayers (yes, even mine) are just plain wrong headed. You may be praying to “God”, but he ain’t listenin’.
Matthew 6:7
And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.
And after all the talk in the gospels about “ask and you shall receive”, James goes and mucks it up with this:
James 4:3
When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.