Sacred Gardens

	After a fire at Holy Trinity Church in South London, a garden rose from the ashes of the sanctuary

Sacred gardens are an ancient tradition in every major culture – the Persians had their gardens of paradise, the Egyptians had temple gardens, the Ancient Greeks had their sacred groves, Daoists, Buddhists and Shintos have their harmonious gardens – and it is a teaching of Judaism, Christianity and Islam that man and woman began life in a sacred garden.

Gardens can be places of meditation and contemplation – or they can be filled with such a riot and chaos of flowers and nature that it is hard not to celebrate Creation.

• In 1993 the Holy Trinity Church in Beckenham in South London was gutted by fire. Instead of trying to restore the ruins or rebuild completely, the congregation decided to construct a new building inside the ruins of the old one. Sacred Land helped fund and design an exquisite enclosed garden in what used to be the chancel, which has a small cobbled fountain in the middle and Virginia creepers, with their red leaves, climbing up the ruined walls as a reminder of the fire from which the garden was born.

	Melangell Centre's sacred garden is used for counselling

• The Melangell Centre in Wales wanted a garden that would be a suitably sacred place for reflection in a counselling centre for cancer patients. Sacred Land co-funded the garden.

• In inner city Lambeth, Sacred Land helped Jamyang Buddhist Centre design a sacred garden on the site of a former courthouse car park. Find out more>

• On the Holy Island of Lindisfarne the community has set up a garden under the Priory walls that replicates some of the plants that were there 1300 years ago when the monks were creating the Lindisfarne gospel. Find out more>


Link here to read an article on sacred gardens in Dutch, published in the Friesch Dagblad on May 31, 2007, and featuring ARC's Sacred Land project.