Working with the elderly in LA

The worldwide order of 3,100 sisters in 32 countries was founded in France in 1839 and will celebrate its centennial anniversary in Southern California next year. This year, the order is commemorating its 25th year in San Pedro, where 10 sisters run a home for about 100 elderly residents.

Many marvel at the order’s survival — their bookkeepers most of all.

The Little Sisters deliberately depend on what they call “divine providence.” The order’s founder, Jeanne Jugan, instructed the sisters not to build an endowment, in contrast with the strategy of many other nonprofit organizations. Instead, the sisters say, they live from day to day, putting full faith in St. Joseph, their patron saint, and their motto: “If God is with us, it will be accomplished.”

At the San Pedro home, for instance, the nuns’ superior, Mother Marguerite, was unruffled when she learned Tuesday that she had to meet a payroll of $80,000 for the lay employees by Friday, even though she had only $21,000 in the bank. “Wait until the mail comes in,” she told the staff.

They did — and that afternoon they received a check for $50,000 from the Burbank-based Fritz B. Burns Foundation and a note from another donor promising enough money to make the payroll.

That was only a minor miracle compared with the whopping $12-million contract to build the order’s San Francisco home that Mother Marguerite signed in 1979 — with no money in the bank. The contractor, she said, asked her where the sisters planned to get the money.

“From St. Joseph,” she calmly replied.