Too Tiny To Live, But Not Forgotten
Reflecting on the work she does for the Holy Sews ministry, Helen Reilly tears up. “When I think about how what I’m making is the only outfit this little baby will ever wear, I still cry,” said Helen.
“You have to not think about it,” said Madeline Bagnardi, another parishioner at St. Mary’s Catholic Church who participates in the effort with Reilly.
Oneonta’s Holy Sews provides hospitals and funeral homes with layettes for preemies and stillborn babies to wear at their burial. It is one of only two New York State chapters of a ministry based at Our Lady of Souls Church in Little Rock, Ark.
The ministry was started in Arkansas in 2008, where a young mother, Regina Binz, lost her baby Ryan at 17 weeks. “He was so small, even the preemie baby clothes didn’t fit,” said Mary Laden, who started the Oneonta chapter in March.
“They had to bury him in a men’s handkerchief,” she said. “These babies have to be buried in anything the parents can find to bury them in – sometimes it’s just a towel.”
Locally, she said, “I know a family who went out and bought a doll. They buried their baby in the doll clothes, but even those were too big.”
Each layette contains a tiny tunic, a hooded wrap, a knitted cap, a receiving blanket, a teddy bear and a prayer card. “It gives these babies dignity” said Helen. “It shows that they are valued, by their parents and by God.”
The tunic the Holy Souls craft is only 7 inches long and ties in the back. The hat fits a golf ball, and the fleece blanket is just barely a square foot, trimmed with lace or organza. “We make them in a variety of colors; pink or lavender for girls, blue for boys, white or yellow for gender neutral,” said Laden.
Laden first heard about the ministry in a 2012 issue of The Evangelist magazine and considered starting a group. “I put out a call in the church newsletter and I only expected three or four people to show up,” she said. “We got 25.”
Some of the women in the group, she said, had their own experience with losing a child.
The group meets once a month to gift-wrap layettes and put together kits containing the pattern and materials. The women then sew the layettes on their sewing machines at home. Several women, including Vicky Rossi, knit and crochet the hats and blankets. All the materials are donated or purchased with donations.
This month, 27 layettes were finished and blessed by Father David Mickiewicz, St. Mary’s pastor, and Father Scott VanDerveer, the parish vicar, then shipped out to hospitals and funeral homes. “It gives comfort to grieving parents that have lost a tiny infant,” said Laden.