The power of prayer...

Lately there’s been a flurry of activity within my religious family. An uncle has required several surgeries to survive and the family has rallied around my aunt for support. When I mistakenly thought my uncle had been life-flighted to Houston I called my aunt to offer my home and services to help her, which she appreciated and acknowledged. But this post isn’t about that, it’s about the craziness these super-religious people engage in when a crisis happens in their lives.

The first wave of emails (which I was surprisingly included) stated the nature of the injury and first attempt towards the recovery of my uncle. Seems my elderly uncle went four-wheeling and had a fall several days ago. While on a driving trip he experienced slurring speech and vomiting which prompted my aunt to take him to a hospital immediately. The injury was so severe that he was life-flighted to a bigger hospital that could handle this type of surgery. This email also included this request:

PLEASE PRAY FOR GOD'S WILL AND PRAY FOR (aunt) TOO. PLEASE PUT (uncle) ON YOUR PRAYER LIST AT CHURCH.....THANKS, (super religious aunt)

I got this email several time during the day, which is alright. My family is a bit computer illiterate and can’t be bothered to read the “sent to” list at the top of the email. A trait I find that seems to be synonymous with religiosity. (Sorry, I’m snarky right now.)

The next email states that my uncle’s condition has not improved and he has gone through another surgery. Another prayer request goes out:

WE WILL KEEP YA'LL POSTED AS WE HEAR ANYTHING...KEEP THEM ON YOUR PRAYER LIST PLEASE.

As the day progresses I get emails from a different person. Although this person is also religious, she doesn’t invoke prayer requests or God/Jesus in anyway. She just reports the facts. Refreshing.

But the other aunt, the one that goes bullshit for God, sends the last email. This one I get from several other relatives first that my uncle is recovering nicely but she can’t stand that she doesn’t know whether I’m getting them or not, so she sends this exact same email directly to me. I’m honored and I know why it was so important that I got it directly:

THIS IS WONDERFUL NEWS......OUR PRAYERS ARE BEING ANSWERED...PRAISE GOD FROM WHOM ALL BLESSINGS COME! I KNOW (aunt) IS ELATED!

This is the email in its entirety. No mention of the doctors and nurses. No mention of the science and medical advances. No mention of my aunt who had the foresight of getting my uncle to the hospital as soon as possible which saved his life. I wanted to email a snarky answer to her but I blocked her emails instead. That felt good.

Tina’s world is getting better and better.

(Note: this super religious aunt is Janice's mother. See yesterday's post. Also I found her email in my spam folder so she might have sent it to me when she sent it out to everyone else. How my name got on her email list I'll never be certain but it seems dubious at best. It's the only email I've gotten from her in years. LOL)