Bethune, Ade, 1914-2002

Ade Bethune was born in Brussels, Belgium, Jan. 12, 1914. In 1928 her family immigrated to the United States. Bethune met Dorothy Day in 1934 and became involved with the Catholic Worker movement. She produced a great deal of original art for the Catholic Worker, including designs for thank-you and Christmas cards for Catholic Worker readers. The demand for these led Bethune to set up an independent mail-order business, which led to the formation of the St. Leo Shop as an outlet for distributing her religious artwork and goods including: cards for religious occasions, icons, calendars, embroidery kits, metalwork, lace and holiday items. It also carried a variety of liturgical publications and became the main North American outlet for Maria Montessori's books on education. Bethune published a yearly catalog that from 1957 onwards became the St. Leo bulletin; it included articles by her and other writers on sacred and liturgical arts. The shop served as an outlet for her many ideas on Catholicism, iconography, and religious art and design and led to the formation of the St. Leo League in 1961. This group met once a month to discuss issues in liturgical art and to publish Sacred signs, a quarterly publication on liturgical arts. Sacred signs ceased in the early 1980s, about the same time that Bethune closed the St. Leo Shop and began to distribute her work through other outlets.

From the description of St. Leo Shop and St. Leo League records, Ade Bethune papers. 1938-1985, bulk 1957-1983. (Newburyport Public Library). WorldCat record id: 702115662

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