John Stokes, Jr. Slide Show Lecture and Narrative Text

FLOWERS OF OUR LADY AND MARY GARDENS SLIDE LECTURE 50 SLIDES AND NARRATION TEXT

50 Slides with accompanying narration.

Slide Groupings

Historical Origins (slides 1-10)
30 Flowers of Our Lady (slides 11-40)
Some Representative Mary Gardens Today (slides 41-50)

Overview

The revealed basis of flowers symbols of Our Lady:
- the Rod of Jesse flower imagery of the Isaias' prophecy of the Virgin Birth of the Messiah
- Biblical flower imagery applied to Mary by the Church Fathers
- flower symbols of Mary discerned in nature by St. Bede, St. Bernard, St. Francis and Dante
- flower symbols of Mary in the popular religious traditions and folklore of the medieval countrysides
- symbolical Marian flower names from oral traditions as recorded in plant dictionaries and floras from the field research of botanists and folklorists.

The Use of Flower Symbols in Marian Veneration, Devotion and Meditation:
- Gothic Cathedral Rose Window and Tympanna figures of Mary, Mother of God, surrounded by images and symbols
- Books of Hours illustrations of the Virgin surrounded by her flower symbols, for meditation
- Mary Garden paintings of the Virgin and Child in gardens of symbolical flowers
- Devotional cultivation of Flowers of Our Lady in monastery gardens
- Entire medieval Mary Gardens of Flowers of Our Lady
- The contemporary Mary Garden movement inspired by the Garden of Our Lady planted at St. Joseph's Church, Woods Hole, Massachusetts in 1932

Copyright, Mary's Gardens 1961, 1997

The John Stokes and Mary's Garden collection was transferred to the Marian Library in May 2013. In addition to his archives, manuscripts, artwork, and personal library, John S. Stokes also donated his extensive website. It was transferred to the Marian Library in 2010. This particular entry is archived content original to Stokes' Mary's Gardens website. It is possible that some text, hyperlinks, etc. are outdated.