Saint Jude

Saint Jude is the Patron of Desperate Causes

St Jude Pray for UsI like to think that St. Jude, a favorite saint of mine, understands and approves of my mission to purge adoration chapels and churches of this superstitious invocation of his name.
Superstition by any other name . . .
Meanwhile, I take a different approach to other popular folk pieties. I generally appreciate Catholic folk customs that involve combining personal prayer with ritualistic actions. When asked, I will offer some perspective and caveats to inquirers because I think some practices can shade off into superstition, but I do not think there is anything inherently superstitious or impious about creating a ritual around praying for intercession for your intentions. In my opinion:
Catholic spirituality is incarnational, meaning that it encompasses both body and soul. Catholics don't just pray with their minds, they pray with their bodies, as can be seen at Mass with the various bodily postures we assume during the liturgy (e.g., standing, sitting, kneeling). Likewise our private devotions can be incarnational. 
In fact, sometimes another form of superstition can enter into play here. Rather than there being a fear that a request for intercession will not be granted unless the directions for prayer and ritual that are given are followed precisely, there can be a fear that freely choosing to participate in personal rituals associated with prayer could prevent the request for intercession from being granted, or could be disrespectful to God or the saint whose intercession is being invoked. Either way, the focus appears to be on the performance of external acts and not on the interior dispositions of the supplicant who acts.
The Church and superstition
Before we go further, let's take a look at how the Church understands superstition. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states:
Superstition is the deviation of religious feeling and of the practices this feeling imposes. It can even affect the worship we offer the true God, e.g., when one attributes an importance in some way magical to certain practices otherwise lawful or necessary. To attribute the efficacy of prayers or of sacramental signs to their mere external performance, apart from the interior dispositions that they demand, is to fall into superstition (CCC 2111).
When Christians hear the word superstition, they usually think of secular rituals that people engage in, such as making a wish while pulling apart a bone or blowing out birthday candles. Generally speaking, Christians usually do not consider that Christian devotions can be undertaken superstitiously. But it is precisely Christian prayer done superstitiously that the Catechism is addressing here.
What the Catechism warns against is that we must not suppose that praying certain prayers in just the "right" away will oblige God to answer them according to our desires. Taking our example of St. Jude, praying for nine days for his intercession can be a good Christian act. But attributing a positive response to those prayers to having been prayed "[in] all four parts [of the prayer] . . . six times each day for nine consecutive days, [while] leaving nine copies [of the novena] in church each day" is superstitious. It is not unlike a magician saying a few words, tapping his wand to his hat, and the audience believing that the words and the taps are the reason he is able to pull out a rabbit.
Superstition in the Bible
When you think of superstition in the Bible, does your mind automatically turn to the story of Judah Maccabeus's men, who took charms with them into battle (cf. 2 Macc. 12:39–45)?
Michelle Arnold