St. Peter leaned closer and whispered:<\/p>\n
“Every time Sister Angela walked into church, attendance doubled.”<\/strong><\/p>\n Father Michael blinked.<\/p>\n “What?”<\/p>\n St. Peter nodded.<\/p>\n “Men came from three towns away.”<\/p>\n Father Michael stared at the magnificent mansion.<\/p>\n Then at Sister Angela.<\/p>\n Then back at St. Peter.<\/p>\n “You mean…”<\/p>\n St. Peter grinned.<\/p>\n “Many came because she was beautiful.”<\/p>\n Father Michael folded his arms.<\/p>\n “Aha! Then they weren’t inspired by faith at all.”<\/p>\n “At first, no.”<\/p>\n “But after they arrived, they listened to your sermons.”<\/p>\n Father Michael paused.<\/p>\n St. Peter continued.<\/p>\n “They joined Bible studies.”<\/p>\n “They volunteered.”<\/p>\n “They brought their families.”<\/p>\n “They were baptized.”<\/p>\n “They donated.”<\/p>\n “They became faithful church members.”<\/p>\n Father Michael’s eyes widened.<\/p>\n “So…”<\/p>\n St. Peter smiled.<\/p>\n “Your sermons kept them there.”<\/p>\n “But Sister Angela got them through the door.”<\/p>\n The nun laughed.<\/p>\n Father Michael looked horrified.<\/p>\n “You’re telling me forty years of ministry succeeded because people had a crush on a nun?”<\/p>\n St. Peter shrugged.<\/p>\n “Heaven uses whatever works.”<\/p>\n The nearby angels started laughing.<\/p>\n Father Michael wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry.<\/p>\n Then St. Peter handed him a thick ledger.<\/p>\n “Look for yourself.”<\/p>\n Father Michael opened it.<\/p>\n Page after page listed names.<\/p>\n Thousands of them.<\/p>\n Beside many entries appeared the same note:<\/p>\n First attended church because of Sister Angela.<\/strong><\/p>\n He flipped another page.<\/p>\n Same thing.<\/p>\n Another page.<\/p>\n Same thing.<\/p>\n Hundreds.<\/p>\n Thousands.<\/p>\n Eventually Father Michael closed the book.<\/p>\n Slowly.<\/p>\n Then looked at the nun.<\/p>\n “Do you mean to tell me you knew?”<\/p>\n Sister Angela smiled innocently.<\/p>\n “Oh, Father. Of course I knew.”<\/p>\n “You did?”<\/p>\n “Certainly.”<\/p>\n “And you never said anything?”<\/p>\n She laughed.<\/p>\n “What was I supposed to say? ‘Please stop coming to church because you think I’m pretty’?”<\/p>\n Even St. Peter chuckled.<\/p>\n Then Sister Angela added:<\/p>\n “Once they arrived, they met God.”<\/p>\n The gates of Heaven fell silent.<\/p>\n Because she was right.<\/p>\n People came for the wrong reasons.<\/p>\n But many stayed for the right ones.<\/p>\n Father Michael shook his head.<\/p>\n “I spent forty years thinking I was doing all the work.”<\/p>\n Sister Angela winked.<\/p>\n “Team effort, Father.”<\/p>\n Then St. Peter placed a hand on his shoulder.<\/p>\n “Besides…”<\/p>\n Father Michael looked up.<\/p>\n St. Peter smiled.<\/p>\n “Your cabin isn’t permanent.”<\/p>\n “It isn’t?”<\/p>\n “No.”<\/p>\n Father Michael brightened immediately.<\/p>\n “So I get a mansion too?”<\/p>\n St. Peter laughed.<\/p>\n “No.”<\/p>\n Father Michael groaned.<\/p>\n Then St. Peter pointed toward a hill overlooking Heaven.<\/p>\n Construction crews of angels were working on an enormous estate.<\/p>\n Bigger than Sister Angela’s.<\/p>\n Far bigger.<\/p>\n Father Michael stared.<\/p>\n “Who’s that for?”<\/p>\n St. Peter smiled.<\/p>\n “The elderly church secretary who made sure both of you showed up on time for forty years.”<\/strong><\/p>\n This time Sister Angela nearly fainted. \ud83d\ude04<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" St. Peter leaned closer and whispered: “Every time Sister Angela walked into church, attendance doubled.” Father Michael blinked. “What?” St. Peter nodded. “Men came from three towns away.” Father Michael … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":49441,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-49440","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-usa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/discovernews9.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49440","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/discovernews9.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/discovernews9.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discovernews9.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discovernews9.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=49440"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/discovernews9.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49440\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49476,"href":"https:\/\/discovernews9.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49440\/revisions\/49476"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discovernews9.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/49441"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/discovernews9.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=49440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discovernews9.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=49440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discovernews9.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=49440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}