cookiesinheaven

Down the hill from the famous Hollywood sign in Los Angeles, 20 nuns spend their days praying and singing and baking at a small monastery. Their 85-year-old order endured the Great Depression, but today's economic crisis finds them struggling again. While the Monastery of the Angels sits in the middle of the hustle and bustle of Hollywood, the Dominican nuns are cloistered from the world in contemplative prayer every morning.

..It's Sister Mary Raphael's job to watch the monastery's money. Lately, she's been watching the monastery's investments and annuities dwindle. In January, she found out the value of the investments had dropped by 70 percent. Plus, medical bills for the elderly nuns drained the bank account, says the mother superior, Sister Mary Raymond.

"So that was when we began to get really scared," Sister Mary Raymond says.

..Today, the sisters are putting their faith in something the monastery's famous for: pumpkin bread. They've been baking and selling it for the past 40 years to help cover expenses.

These days, the nuns get $9 a loaf for their famed pumpkin bread. L.A. City Council member Tom LaBonge is a big fan. When he visited the monastery the other day, he said he buys loaves to give as gifts during the Hollywood Walk of Fame ceremonies and other special occasions.

"I gave President Obama, when he was running for office, a loaf of bread," LaBonge says.

With bread that popular, you would think it would be a big moneymaker for the monastery. But there's just one hitch: The oven is broken. And without it, the nuns are out of business. - npr

Labels: charity, Food, oven