Nuns Launch Latest Assault Against Strip Club In Stone Park
STONE PARK, Ill. (CBS) -- It sounds like a B-movie title: nuns versus strippers.
But it's ongoing dispute in the suburb of Stone Park, where a strip club is preparing to open next to a convent. On Monday, the nuns held a demonstration with unusual weapons: balloons.
CBS 2's Mike Parker reports.
There's a helium shortage these days, but somehow, somebody provided. That allowed kids, parents and others to ink messages of prayerful concern Monday.
And then scores of those balloons went skyward -- or heavenward, as the faithful might say.
Their protest was against the soon-to-open "Get It" gentleman's club.
"It's terrible. This should not be where there are families," resident Mike Carbonara says.
The club is next door to the convent of the Missionary Sisters of St. Charles Borromeo and the order's home for retired nuns. Those structures are just over the border of neighboring Melrose Park.
The sisters have been battling the club for months now.
"We believe in the family values of Stone Park. We want a healthy community," Sister Noemia Silva said.
The Get It club was supposed to open in April, but road construction along Lake Street has slowed those plans dramatically.
"God answers prayers in different ways, whether it's the construction or what have you," Silva says. "Take it whichever way you like it."
Owners of the strip club declined to comment and told CBS 2 to leave the property.
A Roman Catholic legal group, the Thomas More society, recently sent a letter to the owners of the club claiming the state liquor control act forbids a license to the club. The society demanded that the owners "cease and desist" their plan for such a place near the convent.
The owners have not responded.
