c. 2008 Religion News Service

FAIRVIEW PARK, Ohio _ Some people view their misfortunes as signs the world is out to get them.

Harvey Gannon takes them as divine encouragement to stay in business.

In December, Gannon, owner of Gannon’s Religious Gifts and Card Shop, backed away from the brink of closing his 20-year-old store and decided to stay open at least six more months.

But it wasn’t because sales were up.

He made the choice after a long _ and what he considers miraculous _ series of mishaps convinced him God didn’t want him to retire.

“It came really close,” said Gannon, a loquacious man who hugs regular customers and proudly recounts tales of merchandise saving marriages, even lives.

“It came within hours, for sure. … We were already putting stuff on sale. I’d stopped ordering anything.”

For years, family-owned religious supply stores nationwide have been struggling. Customers who once shopped for Bibles, rosaries and Nativity sets are now just as likely to buy those items online or at the local mega-store _ if they buy them at all.

Many religious stores have been forced to either revamp their business models or yield to the competition. Gannon was closer to the latter point as sales at his 12,000-square-foot shop dropped from $200,000 in the late 1990s to $117,000 in 2006.

Last September, he took stock and realized he was on track to end the year with sales under $100,000. He soon made the hard decision to close.

“I had absolutely made up my mind,” Gannon said. “I couldn’t afford it anymore. … I just couldn’t keep absorbing it.

“You have no idea how it broke my heart. I went through two boxes of Kleenex.”

When word of Gannon’s imminent closing got out, broken-hearted customers sent letters wishing him well and thanking him for his 20 years at the store. One anonymous writer even included a money order for $100.

That’s when the litany of minor misfortunes began.

Minutes after Gannon threw away the last tissue, his leaky kitchen faucet started dripping more heavily than ever before. Later that morning, his television suddenly broke.

Then his reclining chair broke. Then the heater on his porch stopped working. After that, the heater in his bathroom gave out.

None of these domestic annoyances posed a serious problem. Altogether, though, the mishaps were occurring with sufficient regularity to catch Gannon’s attention. What’s more, the woes were far from over.

After a week spent visiting his daughter in Virginia, Gannon returned to find his air purifier out of commission. The following week, his garage door jammed.

The next and most expensive misfortune struck a month before Christmas, when the transmission fell out of his 2001 Buick. Happily, the nearby repair shop kindly gave him four new tires for free.

By this point, Gannon was picking up on the pattern and had started having second thoughts about closing the store. Then something happened that removed whatever doubts remained.

One ugly evening about three weeks before Christmas, an elderly couple braved the elements to take three buses to Gannon’s shop, where they bought one of his costlier Nativity sets.

Rather than let the couple attempt the return journey, Gannon offered to drive them. But on that slippery night, Gannon was unable to come to a stop at an intersection and got into a minor accident.

No one was hurt, fortunately. But Gannon was at fault, and the experience shook him enough to make him suspect God was trying to alert him.

“This was telling me I’m not supposed to close the store,” Gannon said. “Even though I’ve turned 65, maybe it’s not time for me. … What else would you get from it?”

Gannon took the cue and called his landlord to ask for a break on his store’s $1,500 monthly rent. Instead of a projected 10 percent increase, Gannon was able to persuade him to lower it instead, to $1,000 a month for six months. The discount brought him back from the edge and gave him enough to keep the store going through First Communion in May, when sales typically surge.

“It’s amazing what God will do when these things happen,” Gannon said.

Darlene Dinishak has been patronizing Gannon’s Religious Gifts all of its 20 years and was delighted when she heard her friend had changed his mind.

“I knew something was going to happen,” she said. “I knew God was going to work to keep the store open.”

Gannon hopes it won’t take an act of divine intervention for him to stay open past May. Then again, if there’s one thing Gannon has, it’s faith.

“There’s a lot of wonderful miracles that happen,” Gannon said. “People don’t believe it, but they do.”

(Zachary Lewis writes for The Plain Dealer in Cleveland.)

KRE/PH END LEWIS800 words

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