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Intro Mary Garden
Mary Garden Jubilee
John S. Stokes Jr.
Queen of All Hearts, June, 1983
1982 Restoration of final, 1937, Harrison Plan
Last year the centennial of St. Joseph's Church, Woods Hole
(on Cape Cod, Massachusetts), was celebrated, together with the
golden jubilee of the Garden of Our Lady on the grounds of the
Angelus Tower of the Church.
Two days before the celebration, a most important event took
place for those parishioners who had been working on the
restoration of the Garden of Our Lady, in accordance with its
originally developed planting plan started in 1932. This event
was the breaking of the "silence" of the symbolic flowers of Our
Lady for the first time since the original planting arrangement
(restored once, after a 1938 hurricane) was washed away, along
with the original identifying plant markers and posted planting
plan, by another hurricane in 1944, and not restored.
The breaking of the silence took place during a twilight
plant labeling party, at which members of the parish "Mary Garden
Society" and friends installed attractive aluminum markers with
black lettering, in the garden, on slender bamboo supports;
together with a planting plan and list, to which they were keyed
by number, in an attractive housing by the entrance to the garden.
In this way the 48 plant varieties were marked - with their
familiar names, religious names, and botanical names - so that
plants in the garden could easily be identified, and plants in the
plan and list could readily be located.
During the placing of the plant markers, another silence was
also broken: that of St. Joseph's Bells in the Angelus Tower, as a
surprise from the keeper of the bells who, with an electrician,
just then completed the installation of needed replacement parts
for the bell ringing mechanism, which providentially had arrived
that very morning. All in all, it had been a week of suspense, as
only a few days before, after several delays, the books giving the
commemorative history of the parish for the Centennial were
received from the printer.
Altogether it was a memorable evening, with a beautiful
sunset and warm summer sea breeze; the freshness of the newly
replanted Garden of Our Lady; the fellowship of the labeling party;
the renewed ringing of the Angelus Bells; the sound of the choir
practicing coming through the open windows of the church across
the street; and the Pastor, Father James P. Dalzell, moving about
among the various groups - in anticipation of the Centennial
Mass, Garden Blessing and Parish Banquet to be held two days
later.
The Centennial
At the Mass, the offertory included a presentation to Bishop
Daniel A. Cronin of Fall River, officiating at the Mass, of
memorabilia from the hundred years' history and also the present
life of the parish. One of the memorabilia presented was a copy
of the May-June, 1982, issue of QUEEN magazine, opened to the
article, "Mary Garden Jubilee", describing the historical
background of the Flowers of Our Lady, named in the popular
traditions of the medieval countrysides but believed to be the
first to have been collected and planted in a public Mary Garden at
St. Joseph's Church in 1932.
Following the Mass, Bishop Cronin, Father Dalzell, other
concelebrants, the Knights of Columbus Honor Guard, altar boys and
parishioners processed across the street, to the ringing of the
noon Angelus, for the blessing by the Bishop of a newly installed
statue of St. Joseph, Garden Workman - executed by artist Ade
Bethune - in a companion garden to the Mary Garden, on the west
Angelus Tower lawn.
The garden blessing recalled the ancient tradition of the
Church of which there are written formulas from as early as the
9th century whereby the grace, light, word and power flowing from
the Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours were extended to the places
and things of daily living and working by sacramental blessing.
For example:
"O almighty everlasting God we beseech thee to bless
these flowers . . . that there may be in them goodness,
virtue, tranquility, peace, victory, abundance of good
things, the plenitude of blessing, thanksgiving to God
the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, and a most
pleasing commemoration of the glorious Mother of God -
that in whatsoever places they shall have been humbly
received trustingly stored up and reverently kept by thy
faithful, they may put forth an odor of virtue and
sweetness."
(Servite rite for the blessing of flowers for
the Coronation of Mary).
The importance of such blessings has been reaffirmed for our
times in the Second Vatican Council Constitution on the Sacred
Liturgy (par. 62) which states:
"The liturgy of the sacraments and sacramentals
sanctifies almost every event in (our) lives . . .
There is hardly any proper use of material things which
cannot thus be directed toward the sanctification of men
and the praise of God."
The Rural Life Prayerbook of the National Catholic Rural Life
Conference describes such sacramental blessings as riches of the
Church which have long been unknown and unused like a treasure
hidden under our very doorstep.
The new garden blessing after the Centennial Mass served to
renew awareness of the Garden of Our Lady as a holy place where
the illuminative, symbolic, sacramentalized mirroring of spiritual
realities by the blest flowers and plants affords a dynamic
support for interior spiritual life and growth.
The mystical illumination and mirroring of spiritual life and
growth by plant life go back to the Gospel parables and figures of
the sower, the grain of mustard seed, the fig tree and the lilies
of the field; and to the Sapiential Books - as has been elaborated
upon and developed by the Church Fathers, saints and mystics
through the centuries. Beginning with St. Bernard's "Sermons on
the Canticle of Canticles" an especially rich vein of development
has come to us through St. John of the Cross, St. Francis de
Sales, St. Louis de Montfort and St. Theresa of Lisieux, the
Little Flower.
By thus "materializing as it were the illusive inner vision
of things invisible", as Elizabeth Haig expressed it in Floral
Symbolism of the Great Masters (1913), symbols and figures from
nature enable us to envisage and aspire to each next step of grace
and light in our reaching and growth towards God in ever
increasing attunement to his will. This sanctifies and
strengthens us for acts of love, justice, mercy, patience, turning
the other cheek, and returning good for evil. And it increases our
openness and responsiveness to the movements of grace, elections
of the Spirit, the shinings of God's countenance. and the leadings
of providence, so that we can proceed in our daily life and work
with quickened faith and hope in our contribution to peace and
renewal.
In this we rediscover the importance of the reservation and
use of plants and flowers as holy religious objects:
"O God . . bless with your holy blessing these roses we
offer to you this day . . as a token of thanksgiving to
you and of love and reverence for the ever blessed
Virgin Mary of the Rosary. Do you, who have bestowed
them as an odor of sweetness for our use and the easing
of our ills, pour forth upon them heavenly blessing
. . . that to whomsoever they may be brought in sickness
may be healed."
(Dominican Rite For the Blessing of roses)
Always, the blessing and the sacramentalized and illuminative
view of the objects of our daily lives - whether the fruits of the
earth or artifacts - provide the immediate source of religious
vision and grace to deal transformingly with whatever is directly
at hand, wherever we are and whatever we are doing.
As we proceed from the Garden of Our Lady with such
heightened sacramental view of the world, to return to our
personal, family, work and community life, and to our
participation in the arts, crafts, sciences, technology, industry
and society, there is presented to us, in bas relief on the bronze
door of the Angelus Tower, St. Joseph in the carpenter shop in
Nazareth, as our example and intercessor. In his carpenter's
trade, St. Joseph surely exemplified the illuminative, sacramental
and transfiguring view of tools, materials and work; a view so
sublimely present in Mary's motherly and household work, as
beautifully recalled by many of her flower symbols.
This deepened sense, during the Jubilee year, of the
inspiration of the Garden of Our Lady for all areas of life, has
been expressed in a prayer:
"Most Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, as our
hearts are raised to you in love through the grace,
light, fragrance and growth of these blest,
transfigured, Flowers of Our Lady, we pray that all
creation may be lifted up resplendent in the new heaven
and new earth of our crucified and risen Lord and
Savior, Jesus Christ.
"We beseech this through the intercession of St. Joseph,
patron of all who labor for the building of God's
Kingdom, and of Blessed and Glorious Mary, ever Virgin,
our Mother, Mystical Rose, Mediatrix of All Grace, and
Queen of Heaven and Earth.
"We ask this in the name of Jesus Christ . . .
"Glory be . . .
"Amen."
Hundreds of visitors, from all over the world, signed their
names in the visitors' book in the Angelus Tower room this summer;
worshippers poured into the Garden of Our Lady after each mass;
Father Dalzell led parishioners in Rosary prayers there; baptismal
and wedding parties socialized in the garden; artists sketched
there; and others came just to rest or read.
As an article in the Woods Hole Weekly summed it up:
"When the Catholic community in Woods Hole built its
first church in 1882, they hardly dreamed it would
become the focal point it is today.
"Now on its hundredth birthday, the small St. Joseph's
Catholic Church has become one of the few forces in
Woods Hole that attempts to bring the community's
diverse population together.
"The cohesive force of the church comes, surprisingly
enough, from a stone tower and a thrice daily chime of
bells . . . in the garden of the church . . . tower and
garden that unite science, art, literature and natural
beauty at the door of the church."
Reprinted with permission.