One Body: Covered By Grace Quilt
12' x 17'
[click to enlarge]
This art piece is featured on the cover of a recently released book by Jens Soering (Maryknoll Books)
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"To worship God is nothing other than to serve people. It does not need rosaries, prayer carpets or robes. All peoples are members of the same body, created from the same breath. If fate brings suffering to one member the others cannot stay at rest." Saadi
"For as the body is one and has many members and all the members of the bodybeing one body, so also is the Christ. For in one spirit we are baptized into one body whether Jews or Greeks, bound or free, and we are all made to drink of one spirit." St.Paul, 1st letter to the Corinthians 12: 12-13
Prison Quilt
Beginning in 1998 I have initiated a program of empowering healing through art processes with my ongoing visits to MCI-Framingham, women's prison. The 3 hour sessions, several times per year provide inmates with a creative spiritual release. The large quilt pictures is a result of a string of special sessions and collaborative help from many hands outside the prison. I facilitate this work as a volunteer and funds are raised for my transportation and materials by donations and individual fund raisers. I would be interested in doing related work appropriate for other groups if the funding was available by any interested organizations and individuals. I am currently attending a year-long institute of ministry for mystics and missionaries and am due to complete written and attended studies for certification by the end of the year 2001.
I would like to express my gratitude to the inmates who participated and to all who made this work complete. Although I had originally hoped to complete all the work of this piece incl stitching inside the prison, there was Another Plan that the body of Christ increase on this project to include the blessings that many diverse hands bring to shared vision. Gifts of skill, resources, finances. And perseverance have all contributed to making this instrument of liturgical worship a thing of beauty and a joy to behold for many more people than I could have imagined.
One Body: Covered By Grace, quilt 12 x 17 feet textile paint on muslin, pieced assemblage, hand and free-motion machine quilted. An image of a cross emerges from a sea of faces. This enormous quilt is a result of sacred art workshops meant to revive and encourage the creative spirit of women in prison. Each woman was provided an opportunity with paint and cloth to express gratitude for her beautification in spirit. In penitence and prayer she may have painted herself onto the cotton fragment. The intent of the process to wipe away tears, the handkerchief-like squares were given to the hands of caring people in the larger community who joined the pieces as it formed the unified body which reflects the image of Christ. This act of blessing by many hands is consecrated in the quilt as it is returned to the chapel at MCI-Framingham where we hope for many years its visual voice will shout out jubilee!
This art piece is featured on the cover of a recently released book by Jens Soering (Maryknoll Books) a life sentenced inmate. Click the link to buy it on Amazon.com
SVADHYAYAD ISTA-DEVATA-SAMPRAYOGAH
“Union with the divine happens through SVADHYAYA, self study, that is to say, witnessing the movements of the body and mind and studying holy books” - Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras translated by Swami Brahmananda Sarasvati.
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