Blessing of the Gardens to be held May 17 in Vermilion |
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Tuesday, 28 April 2009 01:00 |
VERIMILION—Vermilion in Bloom and the Vermilion Ministerial Association invites all area gardeners and those who admire the beautiful works of nature found in gardens to a Blessing of the Gardens at noon May 17 in Victory Park, located at Main and Ohio Streets.
The Rev. Joan Skelley-Watts of Grace United Methodist Church is to preside along with other representatives from the Vermilion Ministerial Association and community churches.
Marilou Suszko, author of “Farms and Foods of Ohio,” segment host on “Our Ohio” (PBS) and a columnist for the Catholic Chronicle, presented the concept to the ministerial association based on rogation services, a historical, traditional ceremony among farmers and agricultural communities.
“Rogation services started centuries ago in France as a response to a time where natural disasters destroyed crops,” Mrs. Suszko explains. “Time has changed the ceremony to some degree so that today you find it has lost its penitential air and has become more festive, celebratory, in fact.”
With a rogation service as the model, she approached the Vermilion Ministerial Association with the idea of a blessing for Vermilion’s home and civic gardens and its community of gardeners.
“Our volunteer force of gardeners, Vermilion in Bloom, is indeed a blessing,” says Mrs. Suszko. “You just have to look around at what’s ‘sprung up’ in all our public spaces over the past five years for our community and visitors to enjoy.”
The Rev. Skelley-Watts, president of the The Vermilion Ministerial Association, also expressed her gratitude for the work of so many dedicated volunteers who tend the flower gardens of Vermilion.
“Dante wrote in 1320 that ‘Nature is the art of God Eternal,’ ” says Rev. Skelley-Watts. “That ‘art’ comes to fruition through creative planning and then hours of labor, maintaining and nurturing the plants. We join with Vermilion in Bloom in this Blessing of the Gardens as we acknowledge God as the giver and nurturer of all life and hope it is supported by our community and becomes an annual event.”
In addition to music, community prayer and refreshments, gardeners are asked to bring a small pail or container of soil from their gardens which will be ceremoniously mixed together, blessed, and distributed back to all of the participants to add to their own gardens.
“This is a symbolic gesture typical of rogation services,” says Mrs. Suszko. “It represents one community working together for a common good, in this case beautiful gardens. It’s a simple way to remind us of our common bond … gardening.”
For more information, contact Marilou Suszko at 440-967-2534 or Vermilion in Bloom, Dana Corogin at 440-967-5299.
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Last Updated on Thursday, 04 June 2009 09:09 |
