LOST $200.00 IN CHURCH -- ON SUNDAY

Some people know that church is the best place to find money.  The nice part about hitting the jackpot in church is that you don't have to feed the One Armed Bandit.  All you have to do it to sit next to a woman who leaves the pew for communion, or some other reason and leaves her purse unattended.  It works like a charm.  Especially if you are a man and you go with your female companion.  Wife or...?  She can open a purse and never catch the attention of the random witness.  This type of sinful behavior is one thing that the traditionalists cannot say that the "Novus Ordo" has changed.  ["Novus Ordo" is code for the Catholic Church's practices since late in the 1960's after the famous Vatican Council.]  Purse rifling was practiced even in the old days, even before pews were invented.  I know.  I was in Rome for four years, remember?  I was in plenty of churches that have no pews.  Pocket picking, purse snatching and other forms of underworld entertainment were commonplace.  Before then, when I was younger, in the 1940's, purse rifling when women went to communion was limited pretty much to the two or three early Masses (services) because people had to fast from midnight onward in order to receive Communion.  It still happened at the later Masses, but usually only in the rear of the church where a quick out was easier.  No one can tell me that it did not happen in those days because my grandfather worked for the pastor of our church for about 45 years, so he knew a thing or two about this.  He used to tell us the stories.  If it happened to someone we knew or to a member of the family, which it did once, it was a story that became a traditional tale before very long.
This thought came to mind today because a lady in our church left her purse unattended in the pew and lost the $200 that is advertised in the title.  Now, don't get fancy with me and ask why she was carrying $200 around...and don't ask me why she thought it was OK to leave it unguarded.  She did tell the Voice from the Kitchen to whom she was later speaking, in tears of course, that she thought it was safe because it was in church.  Yep!  The couple sitting next to her in the pew went to communion all right.  They ate her lunch, and then some.  So,no matter who you are, leave your money home.  If you bring your purse with you to church, never leave it in the pew.
All you guys out there, aren't you glad that you don't carry a purse?
P.S.  This is the second incident of which I am perfectly and factually sure that has happened in our church in the last 6 months.  Neither one of these robberies took place in a full house, or anything near to a full house.