FAITH HEALING
Tom Mazanec

   Dear God, please, if it is Your will, free Laura from this Demon
of Sickness. She is still a child, and she is all I have left after
Alice died. Dear Lord, she has a life ahead of her, serving Your 
Church and bringing others to Christ.
   I remember when she accepted You as Lord and Savior. I was so
happy to know that she would be with You for all eternity but not
just now, please Jesus, she has so much service to give. Please,
she's only twelve years old, don't take her from me now.
   Show the doubters, the marvel of Your Power. They said she would
probably die that time last spring, when she was so sick, but You
spared her life then. Show how You are the Master of life and death
and heal my daughter once more, dear Lord.
   Trick or treat, I can hear them saying outside. The windows are
open, it is so warm. I will close them, keep the blasphemy of
Halloween out of this sickroom. People dressing up as witches and
demons, an abomination is what it is. Dear Lord, how can they be
fallen so low as to dress up as beasts of the fields, or the Devil
himself, even. Do they not know they may become what they pretend?
That horror on TV, with the head of a fly, calling for civil rights
for SCABs. Civil rights for monsters! The head of a fly...the Lord
of the flies...Beelzebub! They are not people, they are horrors
from the pit of Hell.
   God, remember when little Laura made that drawing of Your Son
reaching out His Hands to the fallen of the world? She is such
a budding little artist. She can do so much good, to counterbalance
the filth that is shown in the arts today. Oh, please, spare her
life and help her to make the world a more Christian place. 
Show forth Your Power on this, the very holiday of evil. Make my
daughter a sign of Your Providence. Heal her of this affliction.
   Even with the window closed, I can still hear them chanting for
candy they did not work to earn. Dressing up as something other
than God made them...sinful. Sinful. That is why people are
becoming beasts of the field. It is Your Judgement on them. I thank
You Lord that You have kept Laura pure from that loathsome filth.
Man is made in Your Image, not a snake or a skunk. Serpents...look
at what the serpent did in the Garden. God, how I loath that symbol
of Satan! Free Laura from Satan's grasp and make her well again,
I beseech You.
   Dear God, Laura is such a blessed child. She helps out after
school at the nursing home, keeping company with those poor elderly
people who are all alone. I thank You for sparing her life last
spring, oh dear Lord forgive me for asking it again. If You heal
her, I swear that I will redouble my efforts to stop those mutated
horrors from defiling our Christian nation. SCABs are a pestilence
on America. Please forgive us the sinfulness that brought this
plague to Earth. It was the sin of pride, as at the Tower of Babel,
that did this. We had the arrogance to travel into your Heaven, and
that is what brought this down on us. Man is the Lord of Earth and
not the stars. Forgive us. I will seek to smite these foul SCABs
hip and thigh, dear Lord!
   Oh Jesus my Lord, I beg of You to restore my daughter to health.
I wish only to do Your will and will accept Your decision, but
please give her back her health. I swear I will obey you more
fully in the future, I will be zealous in my war against these
bestial SCABs, whether You restore my daughter or not, but please
God, remember her singing in the school choir? She loves You so
very, very much and I am sure she will be as mighty a soldier for
Humanity as I shall be and together with Your other servants in
Your blessed Church we will rid our country of these vile SCABs.
I praise the Lord that we will!
   I will look at her now, Lord. I go back into the sickroom. 
She is lying quietly in the bed, with a light blanket up to her neck.
I gently place my hand on her forehead. It is drying, no longer 
drenched in sweat as it was the last time I touched it. I 
pull the blanket off her to take her hand and check her pulse.
Her hands are not there. The sleeves are empty. I carefully start
to open her nightgown. There is something wrong with her neck.
Scales! LAMIA! NAGA! JESUSJESUSJESUSJESUSJESUSJESUSJESUSJESUS!!
NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!

DRIZZLE DRAZZLE DRUZZLE DROME
TIME FOR THIS ONE TO COME HOME