(This reflection appears in the May 2025 issue of Associate Update)

By Sister Nancy Liddy

I appreciate quilts! I love the look and feel of them. I am always amazed when our community quilters piece together a mix of different, often apparently mismatched scraps of fabric, and a beautiful, unique, and above all, warm and comforting quilt comes to life.

When I entered the community, I recall how impressed I was with all the lovely knitted, crocheted, tatted, and cross-stitched items created for fundraisers and everyday use. Entering the Mount “craft room” to catch a glimpse of the Sisters stitching away around a quilt frame felt close to entering an inner sanctum especially when the room fell silent after days of labor on Sundays. Their “piecing” skills with the trinity of needle, thread and fabric can still be seen in quilts displayed around the Motherhouse. Just to catch a glimpse of a quilt commissioned for a baptism, wedding, or other significant life event is enormously satisfying. Living with quilts can be uplifting.

The filmmaker Ken Burns, who has quietly collected quilts for over 50 years, said “quilts rearrange my molecules when I look at them.” I resonated with his experience when I gravitated to the colors in the work of an African American community of women from rural Alabama known as “The Gee’s Bend Quilts.” (Photo above.) To my untrained eye, their free-form quilts (without access to patterns they dreamed up their own designs) are as stunning an exploration of color, pattern and craft as I have seen. It turns out these patchworked wonders – assembled from scraps of nothing – piece together a complete history of the hardships and longing of the women of Gee’s Bend where quilting and faith roots run deep. The women sing gospel songs and mantras from the Bible as they stitch. What the women still refer to as “raggedy old quilts,” once placed on walls, floors and beds to shelter their families from the cold, are now considered some of the most “miraculous” works of modern art America has ever produced.

The Gee’s Bend quilts bridge easily from craft to art and now hang in museums. With their pulsating energy certain quilts seem to form a bridge to another realm. In the last year, I have been able to help send quilts to a woman who became pregnant again after the loss of a child; to a friend’s sister as her brother prepared to die; and to a woman beginning advanced cancer treatments. As Catholic Christians we recognize the sacramental nature of created goods in a simple quilt beyond its practical need for warmth. The act of offering to make a quilt or gift a quilt is an expression of love and connectedness.

The younger women of Gee’s Bend have quilts around them that make them aware of their ancestry and who they are. One daughter remembered the words of her mother when her father died – “I’m going to get his clothes, make them into a quilt to remember him, and cover up under it for love.”

Something to Consider

Saint Ignatius of Loyola encourages us to find God in all things. In this Easter season, pay attention to the God within and all around you.