okay, i think i read you a little better now, and i'm sure you realize i wouldn't want you to compromise any sensitive information.

this is a tricky spot. the crux seems to be that the mind is infinitely malleable.
we've seen faith healers slap old women to the floor and thus "heal" them, and i'm sure it works as a treatment on any hysterical disease, any pathology, or psychosoma. whether it works on regrowing lost limbs is matter for another thread. the principle is sound, and freud validated it many times. whenever jesus healed in the bible using this trick, people would thank him, and he would scold them with the reminder that their own faith had healed them. even the woman who ran up to him to touch his robe, and drew power from him, which he felt slip away:
she was using him as a focus for her faith, just as you used these christians. as you said, nothing works without belief, and yours was amplified by the prayer group.
just as any mind can be broken down and reworked, no matter how firmly it holds its beliefs, if it is acted on by persistent pressures long enough, if you keep these people out of sight, and out of mind, and meditate on and around icons and foci forming a gate to where you want to go, you should undo the damage that's been done.
keep in mind that the universe unfolds as it should. the transformation is waiting to happen, and you should know that, both to ease it along, and to convince yourself to let it.
let it happen, relax, and turn yourself over to it.
destiny is just turning over cards already printed, and,remember, you have already started down the path.