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Intro Mary Garden
A Garden Full of Aves
John S. Stokes Jr. The Marianist, April, 1962
In a former era, the now almost legendary Johnny Appleseed
traveled through the pioneer communities of Eastern Pennsylvania
and Ohio sowing apple orchards for the new settlers.
Today on the ever-expanding frontier of devotion to Mary, the
Mother of God, dedicated pioneers are sowing another kind of seed
. . . seed for "Mary Gardens" of symbolical "Flowers of Our
Lady."
One such ardent gardener is Bonnie Roberson of Hagerman,
Idaho, who found, in tending her own Mary Garden and in helping to
start others, a way of uniting her love of gardening with her
devotion to Mary.
.
For a number of years before she learned of the Mary Garden
idea, Mrs. Roberson, with the assistance of her husband, had grown
a garden of herbs as a hobby and as a means of income. Being
especially interested in the traditional lore of herbs, which
extends back to medieval times and on back into the mists of
antiquity, she had named it the "Garden of Memories."
Among the herbs in the garden, she had particular affection
for those associated by legend with the life of the Holy Family.
She loved to recall that sweet-smelling thyme and marjoram and
tansey, all once known as "Our Lady's Bedstraw," were reputed to
have been present in the straw of the manger at Bethlehem.
She would recall also that bitter and sour herbs like
dandelion and sorrel traditionally were regarded as symbols of the
bitterness of Our Lord's passion and Our Lady's sorrows. Fragrant
roses and lilies, according to an early Christian tradition, were
found in Our Lady's tomb after her assumption into heaven. The
favorite - herbs, spearmint, alecost and fennel - were called Our
Lady's Mint, Our Lady's Balsam and Our Lady's Fennel. Sage,
because of its many beneficial qualities, was believed to have
been blessed by Our Lady.
Reflection on these rich associations warmed Mrs. Roberson's
heart as she worked in the garden each day. In time she came to
understand that they bore witness to a profound religious truth.
They were not just historical curiosities or superstitions. They
were much more than this.
They testified to the intuitive discovery of medieval
Christians that, of all God's creatures, none could surpass fragrant
herbs and flowers in suggesting and recalling our Lady's spiritual
sweetness: soothing and healing herbs in suggesting her heavenly
mercy and succor; or bitter and sour herbs in suggesting her
bitter sorrows.
Steeped in the religious symbolism of herbs, Mrs. Roberson
learned through the National Catholic Rural Life Conference of a
project, Mary's Gardens, in Philadelphia, dedicated to restoring
the custom of growing an entire Mary Garden of plants associated
with Our Lady.
Through literature obtained from this organization, she
learned that, besides herbs, there were a large number of garden and
wild flowers whose characteristic forms and colors and seasons had
been adopted in medieval times as reminders of Mary's virtues and
mysteries.
It became evident to Mrs. Roberson that flowers are
unexcelled in suggesting for our meditation the immaculateness of
Mary's purity, the beauty of her holiness, and the splendor of her
heavenly glory.
In a flash Mrs. Roberson saw that a Mary Garden would not be
a garden of memories of the past but a work of prayer and devotion
in the present and continuing into the future. Such a wealth of
plant and flower symbols would help keep the fullness of Our
Lady's virtues and mysteries in mind for prayer and meditation
during garden work. They would also be a constant reminder to
offer the joys and sacrifices of the work for spiritual intentions.
Happily there was an unused area in her yard in which she
could plant a Mary Garden around a statue of the Virgin and Child.
Entirely separate from the Garden of Memories, the Mary Garden
would be undertaken as a work of veneration and prayer to Our
Lady, and nothing in it would be offered for sale. Flowers would
be picked from the garden only for church, for adornment of Our
Lady's statues, or for the sick.
In the spring and summer Mrs. Roberson sowed seeds and rooted
cuttings of Our Lady's biennial and perennial flowers in nursery
beds. In the fall she laid out and dug the Mary Garden in the form
of a cross with a surrounding rectangular border, and planted
bulbs of Our Lady's Flowers.
.
Spring
Early the following spring she started seeds of Marian annual
flowers indoors at a sunny window. Then, when the weather warmed
up, she moved the plants and seedlings from the nursery beds and
seed boxes and planted them in the garden according to the plan
she had drawn in the fall.
Now at last, after a year of anticipation, the Mary Garden was
a reality. Mrs Roberson plunged into the work of watering it and
cultivating it with joy, giving loving care to each plant. Just
the sight or thought of the Mary Garden gave new meaning to her
work in the Garden of Memories as well, and, in fact, to her
housework and to her entire day.
As customers came to pick out plants from the Garden of
Memories, or as neighbors came to call, she would take them for a
visit to the Mary Garden, showing them the symbolism of the plants
and flowers. From the religious meaning of the plants, their
arrangement around the central statue of the Virgin and Child, and
their careful cultivation, visitors immediately sensed this was a
very special kind of garden, a garden of peace and prayer and
love, a garden with a fullness of meaning and beauty not to be
found in the usual herb or flower garden.
Soon strangers began to make visits especially to see the
Mary Garden. Letters asking for information started coming in from
those who lived too far away to make a visit.
At home Mrs. Roberson found that her twenty-months-old
granddaughter, Juanita Marie, adopted the Mary Garden as her
favorite outdoor spot. She loved to run over to kiss "the Baby
first and then the Mama" each time she entered it. Neighboring
children of preschool age seemed to take more interest in the
story of Mary and Jesus as told by the plants of the Mary Garden
than from their religious picture books.
.
Summer
As soon as Mrs. Roberson noted the very real interest in the
Mary Garden from adults and children, gardeners and non-gardeners,
and people of all faiths, she started additional seeds and cuttings
of Our Lady's Flowers as a surplus from which to help others start
Mary Gardens of their own.
She also began accepting invitations to speak on the Mary
Garden idea before garden clubs and religious groups. By fall, a
garden club from Boise, one hundred miles away, had chartered a
bus to make a special trip to visit the garden.
Realizing that others were not as readily able as she to
start a Mary Garden, she conceived a plan. Each year she would
help start several Mary Gardens at religious institutions by
providing plants as a gift and then personally joining in the
actual work of planning, digging, and planting the gardens. With
the progress of the seasons she would return from time to time to
give further gardening instructions and also to share her concept
of the prayerful meaning of the garden and the work of caring for
it.
.
Fall
The following spring she was able to assist in starting three
gardens. This year she is helping with two more Mary Gardens: one
at Mercy Academy in Buhl, and the other an adjunct to the famous
Our Lady's Garden Rosary, laid out in the form of giant rosary
beads surrounded by rose bushes, at the Holy Family Convent of the
Missionary Sisters of St. Benedict, Benet Lake, Wisconsin. For
this last garden she has prepared a detailed planting plan.
To families who wish to start Mary Gardens around their
backyard Mary Shrines, she explains how a Mary Garden can be built
up gradually over several years by using those Flowers of Our Lady
already commonly grown in home flower gardens in the region and
requiring no special gardening knowledge. Such plants provide a
tried and true foundation for a Mary Garden which even beginning
gardeners can plant with confidence.
To those who already have gardens or flower beds, she
explains which of their flowers are especially associated with Our
Lady and suggests that they learn to know them and to think of
them according to these associations, which have come down to us
through the ages.
Mrs. Roberson's Mary Garden work has also received recognition
among established horticulturalists. An article on her garden
appeared in a recent issue of The Herb Grower magazine, together
with articles on Synagogue Gardens and Bible Gardens, and she has
been asked to exhibit a miniature replica of her Mary Garden at
the annual meeting of the Herb Society of America in Washington,
D.C., this month.
With this solid beginning, Mrs. Roberson hopes to see more
and more Mary Gardens established locally and nationally. Through
her reading and research she has made substantial contributions to
the library and files of the international Mary Garden center in
Philadelphia.
She envisages the rich community of Christian friendship and
sociability which can be developed everywhere through garden
visits and through the exchange of seeds, plants, and gardening
information.
Hopefully Mrs. Roberson's example will inspire many others to
become Mary-Gardeners, and perhaps, like her, to become
Mary-Garden Missionaries themselves.
Reprinted with permission
See "Mary Gardener of Love"