(FORTUNE Magazine) – On Wall Street John M. Templeton, 76, is known as an astute money manager who controls $14 billion in assets. But religious leaders around the world know him as a devout man who annually awards a large cash prize to recognize ''progress in religion.'' With a purse of $435,000, the Templeton Prize is worth more than a Nobel. Says Templeton: ''Alfred Nobel had a blind spot. He omitted the most important area where growth is needed -- spirituality.'' Templeton began his awards in 1972. By that time his money management firm was already a Wall Street legend. (His best-known mutual fund, Templeton Growth, has appreciated more than a hundredfold since he started it in 1954.) He says daily prayer helps him manage investments more effectively, provided it's the right kind of prayer. Pleading ''Oh, God, let there be a takeover attempt today'' isn't likely to work. But an investor who thanks God each day and asks for his guidance will be ''less likely to make stupid mistakes,'' says Templeton, who begins business meetings with a nonsectarian prayer. This year's prizewinners were George MacLeod, 93, a Church of Scotland clergyman who founded a monastic community, and Carl Friedrich Freiherr von Weizsacker, 76, a German physicist and theologian who studies the connection between science and religion. Past recipients include Mother Teresa, Billy Graham, and Alexander Solzhenitsyn. Templeton, a Presbyterian who works out of an office in the Bahamas, says Wall Street's reputation as a sinkhole of sin is undeserved. ''It's true that there's plenty of evil in the world,'' Templeton says, ''but the level of faithfulness is greater in the business world than in other fields.'' Now there's a nice thought to take home tonight.