My Aunt Worshipped A Minion Of Hell

My Aunt wrote many, many letters to God. She said they were better than spoken prayers because you didn't forget what you'd asked for a few nights before, so you could check the results, and thus be truly thankful. She said that God answered most prayers in some fashion but that people weren't thankful enough because they'd forgotten what they'd asked for in the first place. A written letter is less demanding of the Lord's attention; he can read them when he has time. The Lord appreciates that kind of thoughtfulness.

She kept her prayers in a chest at the foot of her bed. Now and then I go to Aunt's old room and flick through the chest. I found this today, written in her unique looping scrawl:

"Dear Saint Judas Iscariot,

How are you? Oh I'm fine. I was wondering if you would intercede on my behalf on a small matter. My twice-nephew Nick (by blood and marriage) seems to be having more and more trouble getting along with the kids at his school. Nick is a delicate child with a strange temperment, much like his father at his age. I fear that unless he finds acceptance amongst his peers, he will go the same way as my poor cousin. I worry especially because his mother, bless her soul, was something of a free spirit, and not possessed of the strongest of characters or the most stable of natures. (In fact, with her dancing and her rough language, I often thought she might be possessed of some kind of demon. I warned my cousin about her many times, but there you go. I hope her soul is at peace now, or at least showing the the correct amount of repentance if it has ended up in the other place.) The boy is a combination of bad sorts. If it's at all possible, I do not want to see him gunned down like a mad dog before he's thirty.

I know you have some experience in this area. You yourself have done wrong; but you were forgiven and made into the Saint of Lost Causes. Right? Saint Jude? Like Nick, you were a lost cause. But you found acceptance amongst your peers even after betraying OUR LORD INCARNATE. Perhaps you could guide our boy Nick on the right path.

That's all I wanted to ask. My thanks and praise go to you."

She's mixed up Judas Iscariot with Saint Jude. There are hundreds of letters just like this, asking "Saint Judas Iscariot" to help her family in one way or another, often referring to me as her "little lost cause."

Is that why we've had such bad luck over the years? Has my life been shaped by a Minion of Hell? What did this history of devil worship mean for my Aunt's immortal soul, I mean did she go North or South? I'm going to have to talk to the Reverend Keith about this. Rev. K. helps me out with these kinds of questions.

On another note: it also seems that Aunt knew my father. That's interesting too. Uncle always said nobody knew who my father was, not even my mother.