The Weaving Project

The Weaving Project at St. Mark’s sponsored by the Liturgical Arts Group in conjunction with the Worship Committee and the Arts Council.

The beginnings of weaving are lost in antiquity yet its imagery appears in legends around the world: the Greek fates (Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos) spun, measured, and cut the threads of human destiny; Egyptian Neith wove the world from her heavenly shuttle; Japanese Amatersu spun and wove sunbeams; Germanic Frigga spun the clouds, and Native American Spider Woman wove the four directions.^[1]

The Hebrew scriptures first mention weaving during the Israelites time in Egypt. Later, God describes the decoration of the tabernacle the Israelites are ordered to built to house the Ark of the Covenant and the vestments for Aaron and the priests, and weaving becomes a frequent metaphor for our relationship with God and each other.

All parishioners, age 10 and up, are invited to try their hand at this ancient craft as we create the new paraments for Late Pentecost (mid-October to December). The chosen colors are those of autumn: the green of Pentecost is deep and the other colors, rust, gold, maroons, metallic copper, are contrasted with a blue for the autumn sky.

You Too Can Weave

The loom being used is a rigid heddle portable table loom made of cherry. It is warped with cotton thread and the weft threads are cotton, wool, silk, and synthetic. It can be used to weave cloth up to 24” in width and about 15’ in length. Weavers choose which thread they wish to use and weave for as long as they wish, creating bands of varying width.

Weaving opportunities will be most Sundays, after church, in the Parish Hall, until we are done. The plan is to produce three stoles, a veil (for the altar), Bible markers, and a pulpit fall: seven pieces in all, a number frequently used to suggest completeness.

When finished, 72” lengths of each color will be sent to the Thread Project for inclusion in the seven World Cloth being woven in South Carolina.

These are being woven from the threads collected from people around the world to “celebrate the boldness of our cultural diversity, while demonstrating the strength and beauty of global unity”.^[1]

[1] Helwig, Terry,”Materialize Your Visions”, Spirituality and Health. August, 2004; p.49

[2] ibid., 48.