Respect all, fear nun - part one
By Diana the Valkyrie
The orphanage is defunded

I run an orphanage, but it's very different from the usual
orphanages.

I'm Fiona, a nun on loan from St Hilda. You'll remember St Hilda's,
the convent with the motto "Nil bonum sine passione", which means "No
pain, no gain" and denotes the way we use Septadecaherbis and heavy
iron to build massive muscles. The ingredients for the seventeen
herbs and spices of Septadecaherbis are, of course, a secret.

For a St Hilda's nun, I'm less than the average size - my arms are
only 21 inches. My best friend Mandy is 24, Nora is 26. But 21 is
usually enough. Mandy says that "biceps aren't everything", and
proves it by showing her enormous thighs. I don't have huge thighs,
but I do have a useful brain.

Anyway, back to the orphanage. Apart from the fact that it's run
by nuns seconded from St Hilda, we're very focused towards the
kids. It's bad enough that they're orphans, and don't know the love
that only parents can give. We do our best for them, but there's
a limit to how much love three nuns can give to 24 kids.  It's not
that we lack love. It's that there simply isn't enough time in each
day to give them what they'd get from a family, from parents.

But here's my clever idea. Dogs. As well as 24 kids, we have 24
dogs. Dogs will give unlimited love, unconditional love, and will
be constantly available playmates. Plus, each kid has to care for
his or her dog, so they learn how to give as well as take.

Yes, it makes it more difficult to run the place, but I think it's
worth the extra trouble. And, of course, if one of the kids does
get adopted, the dog goes too.

Does it work? If you could see the kids playing with their dogs, if
you could see the way each dog looks at their own kid, you wouldn't
need to ask. Yes, it costs more to have 24 dogs in addition to the
children, but it's worth the extra.

Or so we thought.

I was called to the mother house one day, to see Nancy, the Mother
Superior.  She'd received a letter, and she wanted me to see it. When
I read it, my reaction was "They can't do this!". But, of course,
they could.  We were defunded. "No!" I said, "We can't ... they
can't ..."

Nancy gave me a tissue. I blew my nose. "Can we get funding from
the mother house?" I asked. But I already knew the answer. We had
no money.  St Hilda's nuns take a vow of poverty. "So we have to
close? What about the children, we can't just toss them out onto
the street!"

Nancy nodded, "Of course not. Fiona, you're a very resourceful
person. I'm relying on you to find a way to deal with this."

Huh. On the one hand, I was flattered that she thought that I might
be able to deal with this - on the other hand, I was having this
huge problem dumped on me. But what choice did I have. "I'll pray
to God," I said in a rather wobbly voice, and Nancy said "We'll
all pray with you."

In my experience, prayer works best when accompanied by action. I
don't know why this would be, because God always answers our prayers.
I suppose prayer alone would work, but I'm reluctant to try that
experiment.

I went back to the orphanage, and told Mandy and Nora the bad news.
They were as angry as I was, but angry at who? I looked at the
letter again - it was signed by Ronald Avebury. "Tomorrow," I said,
"we go and talk to this man. Mandy, you stay with the kids." Because
you can't leave kids on their own for very long. "Nora, you come
with me." I wanted Nora, because she looked really intimidating,
especially if she rolled up her sleeves.  "And we won't tell
the kids just yet." "We'll have to tell them some time," Mandy
pointed out. "Mands, the other thing I want you to do tomorrow is,
assuming we don't get another nickel in funding, how long can we
hold out? There's some cash in the bank account, there's some food
in our stores - I want you to work out what our hard deadline is."

"But what if they send in the bailiffs to chuck us out?" asked
Nora.  "Then we resist. God is on our side, and we can call for
reinforcements from the mother house. I'd like to see a bunch of
cops try to take on a bunch of St Hilda's nuns!" Mandy laughed,
and cracked her knuckles.  "No violence!" I said. "Unless they
start it," pointed out Mandy. "No Mandy, then we turn the other
cheek." Mandy nodded, but she and Nora exchanged glances, and I
suspected that cheeks might not be entirely turned.

"No," I said, "if it comes to that, they'll try to starve us
out. And cut off electricity, gas and water. So we'll get ready
for a siege. And if they do try that, then we'll call the media,
and portray poor weak nuns being oppressed by The Man."

Read the rest of the story on https://www.amysconquest.com