Devotional gardens inspire prayer, peace, and beauty

Maybe it’s a little early to be thinking about spring. Maybe there’s one last blizzard blowing through our North Dakota prairie as you read this. But in mid-March, I had the pleasure of chatting with Terrie Mann, parishioner of St. Michael’s Church in Grand Forks, and our conversation has me itching to get my hands in the dirt.

Terrie Mann received her first taste of gardening as a child with her grandma. When she moved to a 2.5-acre lot south of Grand Forks in 1989 with her husband, Michael, there was just a potato field, or rather, a blank canvas.

When she became Catholic in 2008, she heard about Mary gardens from Real Presence Radio, which opened to her a new way of looking at gardening. Then her sister gave her the first Mary statue for the garden—Our Lady of Grace. The garden was then consecrated to the Blessed Virgin Mary, and Trinity Gardens emerged.

“From the very beginning I embraced being Catholic,” said Terrie. “As the garden grew so did I, especially my devotion to the Blessed Mother. She always takes you to Jesus. Through the garden, I sense this growing relationship with her and Jesus, the Holy Spirit, and God the Father.”

As Terrie’s devotions grew, so did her garden. Beyond the traditional Mary garden, she created parts of her garden to represent other devotions: The Holy Trinity, The Sacred Heart of Jesus with Divine Mercy, The Tree of Life, a Eucharist Medallion depicting the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Our Lord, The Resurrection, a Eucharist Grape Arbor, The Therese Grace Memorial Garden of Life, and The David Michael Memorial Garden for the Unborn.
 
“If I go out into the garden and walk it with our Lord, he’s showing me the flowers, he’s showing me this incredible detail and beauty of his creation and I’m with him in it. It touches my heart and changes me. You can find incredible things in God’s creation. In the garden, I’m an artist with him. It’s an incredible experience to be with God. God knows I’m curious and have a sense of adventure. I have a lot of unique plants and miracles in the garden. I never know what Jesus is going to surprise me with next!”

The tradition of planting Mary gardens in particular goes back centuries. When much of the population was illiterate, priests and religious brothers and sisters planted gardens and gave the flowers and herbs religious names and attached meaning to them in order to teach people about the faith, in the same way they used stained glass windows to tell stories of the Bible or the saints. The first recorded Mary garden was by an Irish saint, St. Fiacre, patron saint of gardeners, in the 7th century. From there, gardens spread worldwide, especially after all the apparition sites of Our Lady.

Flowers and plants have long been symbols for various saints and devotions. Many saints including St. Joseph, St. Kateri Tekakwitha, St. Anthony of Padua, and St. Gabriel at the Annunciation, are often depicted with a lily to represent purity and chastity. Palms were used to welcome Jesus to Jerusalem and later came to represent the victory of martyrs. St. Agnes and St. Sebastian are frequently depicted with palms.

Mary is known as the “mystic rose” and many other saints are depicted with roses as well, including St. Elizabeth of Hungary, St. Rose of Lima, St. Thérèse of Lisieux, and St. Juan Diego at the apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Of all the flowers, the rose is the most closely connected with the Virgin Mary. The rose is the queen of flowers and Our Lady is the queen of heaven. Roses symbolize love and remembrance as well as the blood of Christ (red), purity (white), happiness (pink), and glory (gold/yellow).

The meanings of some of flowers can vary. Some have more than one meaning, or there can be multiple names for the same flower. Some meanings derive from legends. Here are a few examples:

• Violets represent Mary’s humility.
• Lily-of-the-Valley represents Our Lady’s Tears. These flowers are said to have blossomed from Mary’s tears for her son as she stood at the foot of the cross.
• It’s said that a juniper bush saved the life of Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus when they fled to Egypt. The juniper bush opened its branches to shelter the Holy Family when Herod’s soldiers drew near them.
• Fuchsia are called Our Lady’s ear-drop. A legend claims that baby Jesus hung these flowers on his mother’s ears as jewels.
• The iris is called the “sword lily” because of the sword-shaped leaves. The leaves represent the words which Simeon spoke to Mary, when she and Joseph were in the temple to present the infant Jesus. Simeon’s said to Mary, “Behold, this child is destined for the fall and rise of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be contradicted, and you yourself a sword will pierce” (Luke 2:34-35).

There’s no right or wrong way to create a Mary garden or any devotional garden. Half the fun is experimenting with which flowers and plants you like best and deciding what symbols you want to highlight. Another idea for a garden is to consider the mysteries of the rosary—Joyful, Glorious, Luminous, and Sorrowful—and create a space that represents the life of Christ.

Terrie Mann gives this example for a Joyful Mystery garden.

• Annunciation of the Lord: White lilies to represent Mary’s purity.
• The Visitation: Columbines. Legend has it that they grew beneath Mary’s feet as she journeyed to visit her cousin, Elizabeth.
• The Birth of Our Lord: Ox-eye daisies. Legend has it that the Magi found these before finding the Holy Family when Christ was born.
• The Presentation at the Temple: Irises to represent the sword that pierced Mary’s heart.
• The Finding of Jesus in the Temple: Impatiens to represent Mary’s joy of finding Jesus.

Visitors to the garden say they feel at peace in Terrie’s garden. The garden is an extension of her desire to live a life centered on God. Terrie’s faith continues to grow as gardens change and she spends time in prayer there. A garden is never finished; it’s a work in progress just as we are in our need for constant conversion.

“It’s like I’m living one step in heaven and one step in the world,” she said.
So how does one start a Mary garden or any kind of devotional garden? Start simple.

“Start with a statue of Mary, have it blessed, and ask her to help you. All you need is a statue or image, a plant—indoor or outdoor—and you have a Mary garden. There are hundreds of plants associated with Mary gardens, and it can be as big as you want or a single flower in a pot. You can create theme gardens by the meanings of the flowers or whatever you enjoy and just have fun. Starting with Mary is extremely smart. She will always lead you to Jesus and his beauty.”

If you are interested in knowing more about devotional gardens, email Terrie Mann at [email protected].