SISTER MARY BERNADETTE
Thanks to this smiling nun from Canton, Ohio, many a sinner playing hooky on a Sunday morning may have found admittance to heaven after all. For by skipping church and going fishing, the sinner has helped make it possible for Sister Bernadette and the other nuns of Canton's Sancta Clara Adoration Monastery to build a new convent for their order.
Seeking ways to raise money for this project some years ago, one of the sisters suggested that the order raise and sell red worms as bait to the local fishermen. When the mother superior, appalled at the notion of worms squirming all over her convent, quashed the idea, the sister suggested there might be even more money in the manufacture of artificial bait.
The mother superior agreed, and the sisters went to work making some sample lures under the guidance of Sister Bernadette, who was once a pretty fair angler. Tested in a convent bathtub, the lures held up fine, and the sisters went into production with what they called St. Peter's Fishing Lures.
In the 18 months since then, St. Peter has brought the nuns some $8,000 in profits, and a new convent is already under construction in Birmingham, Ala.
PHOTO