Eileen Egan

Eileen Egan (1912–2000) was a journalist, Roman Catholic activist, and co-founder of the Catholic peace group, American PAX Association and its successor Pax Christi-USA, the American branch of International Pax Christi. Starting 1943 she remained an active member of Catholic Relief Services, and a longtime friend of Mother Teresa, she wrote her biography Such A Vision: Mother Teresa, the Spirit, and the Work, and marched with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. at Selma. She first coined the term "seamless garment" to describe the unity of Catholic teaching on life issues.

Born in Wales, she moved with her family to New York City in 1926, and completed her secondary education at Cathedral High School. Later she graduated from Hunter College in 1933, and began a career as a freelance journalist.

In 1943 she joined the staff of the U.S. Bishops' War Relief Services (later known as Catholic Relief Services, or CRS) as its first professional layperson. Her first assignment was in Mexico, where she worked with displaced Polish war refugees. The following year she was posted to Barcelona, where she ministered to victims of the Holocaust. She then headed the CRS office in Lisbon, Portugal.

Back in New York briefly in 1945, she was out of the office the July day a B-25 crashed into the CRS headquarters on the seventy-ninth floor of the Empire State Building. Ten fellow staff members were killed. The following year, Egan was back in Europe helping to resettle waves of displaced persons. Writier Mike Aquilina observed that "...these works of mercy might involve carefully planned news leaks, sifting through propaganda or misinformation campaigns, or even ... using Chicago’s Polish vote to protect Polish refugees." She later received the highest honor awarded civilians by both the French and German governments.

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