By: By Jennifer Willems

EAST MOLINE — Even during casual conversation, Ann Tilton has a rosary in her hands. It’s wrapped inconspicuously around her left wrist and she fingers it in a very natural way as she talks.

“I just love to pray the rosary,” she shares with a broad smile, confiding that many times she falls asleep while she’s praying and finds it next to her when she wakes up.

It’s a habit that has served her well for 100 years and has earned her the title of “prayer warrior” of Women in God’s Service, also known as WINGS, at St. Anne’s Parish in East Moline. The group helped her celebrate her milestone birthday on Nov. 4 with cake, a mountain of cards, and a special present.

“Ann, this is our gift to you, to pray a rosary for you and with you,” said Corinne Briggs of WINGS, who led the women in prayer.

“How beautiful,” the birthday girl exclaimed with another beaming smile. Afterward, Mrs. Tilton insisted that they pray one more decade of the rosary “for all of you.”

“Ann is so spiritual,” Briggs told The Catholic Post while everyone was enjoying cake. “She just passes that on to everyone she meets. That’s why people gravitate toward her — it just radiates from her.”

“If you have a problem and you need a prayer, she’s the one you go to,” said Marlene Brown, a member of WINGS and the extraordinary minister of holy Communion who brings the eucharist to Mrs. Tilton each week.

“She says the prayer after Communion. I just sit back and listen,” Brown said, adding that Mrs. Tilton prays for WINGS and everyone at St. Anne’s, as well as her “special people.”

That prayer has power.

“She prayed for St. Anne’s to have a deacon for years and she got her prayers answered,” said Mrs. Briggs. In 2002 her husband, Jim, was ordained to the permanent diaconate and now serves the East Moline parish.

“She prayed us a deacon,” Mrs. Brown confirmed, shaking her head and smiling at her friend.

A SPECIAL FRIEND
Born at home in rural Hartington, Neb., on Nov. 4, 1910, Mrs. Tilton and her family moved to Carroll, Iowa, when she was 2. Raised on a farm, she remembers milking the cows with her mother, “a wonderful, wonderful woman.”

During her young adult years she worked in shops, one of them for Buddy L Toys for 14 years. After moving to East Moline more than 50 years ago, Mrs. Tilton said she did a lot of housework for people and was a baby sitter.

“I love to do my own home — to cook and bake. I miss that,” said Mrs. Tilton, who now lives at Hope Creek Care Center in East Moline.

One of the people who benefited from her skills as a homemaker and baker was Msgr. William J. Cleary, the founding pastor of St. Anne’s Parish. After being named a senior priest of the Diocese of Peoria in 1972, he retired to the first floor of her house and was cared for by her for the last five years of his life.

“He was a great priest for the sick ones and for those who didn’t have any money,” Mrs. Tilton recalled. “He was very good to people in need.”

Because she lived a block or so from the church, parishioners were able to stop by and visit their beloved “Father Cleary” often. Longtime friends Rex and Sharon Scranton said part of the attraction were the pies she baked every day and her specialty — angel food cake.

“Father Cleary loved his pies,” Mrs. Tilton said, “but no cream pies. His favorites were the fruit pies.”

In his turn, he celebrated Mass for her every day.

LOVE FOR ST. ANNE’S
While Mrs. Tilton shared her love for the rosary with The Post and said she sang soprano in the parish choir for many years, Rex Scranton added that she belonged to the Blue Army, was involved in Cursillo, and was part of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal in Bloomington and Peoria, often taking part in Life in the Spirit seminars.

WINGS has also been important to her, according to Lona Friedman, who said Mrs. Tilton attended every meeting unless she wasn’t feeling well.
That has become more difficult since she gave up her own residence two years ago, so the group brought their November meeting to her.

“She kind of mothered us,” Brown said.

For her part, Mrs. Tilton says simply, “I always enjoyed it. I still miss them.”

News of Mrs. Tilton’s 100th birthday has traveled far and wide. Messages were sent not only to Willard Scott of the Today show but to President Barack Obama as well.

A card shower for her continues. Anyone who would like to wish her well may send cards to her at Hope Creek Care Center, 4343 Kennedy Drive, East Moline, IL 61244.