Art, spirituality, and pilgrimages have a long history. And while most think people think that one has to travel to Europe or Asia to find such experiences, several significant religious art sites are closer than one thinks.
So for those looking for a personal journey or looking for something different, here’s a guide to some quick road-less-traveled outings.
The New Jersey Buddhist Vihara & Meditation Center (NJBV & MC) in Kingston says its 10-acre spiritual center includes a Buddha statue it says is the largest of its kind in the Western hemisphere.
The site was established in 2003 when the director of the center purchased the house as a meditation center for Americans from Sri Lanka. To enhance the religious experience, the 30-foot-tall Buddha statue in meditation posture (or Samadhi) was unveiled in 2009 to connect visitors to the enlightened figure whose teachings provide a path through earthly suffering and to spiritual transcendence.
The gleaming white statue was built by a Sri Lankan Buddhist monk sculptor. The brick and mortar figure was built from the ground up and is supported by a concrete pedestal.
And while it can be seen, the nonprofit center is currently a work in process. As the center’s material notes, the expansion project consists of an “aesthetically pleasing and environmentally friendly building of approximately 11,000 square feet, meditation trails through the woods, a footbridge over a meandering stream, and pleasing landscaped meditation gardens. The building will house a library, meditation hall, resident for the clergy, and areas for community gatherings. The primary mission of this center is to act as a resource for all communities, establishing programs for ‘interfaith dialogue & encouraging visits from groups & scholars for such interaction.’”
New Jersey Buddhist Vihara & Meditation Center, 4299 Route 27, Kingston. 732-821-9346 or www.njbv.org.
Next stop is the National Blue Army Shrine of the Immaculate Heart of Mary in Washington, New Jersey, about 45 miles or one hour from the U.S. 1 office in Lawrence.
Following the signs from Route 31 that take you on back roads through fields, you’ll come to the spot where a bronze statue of Madonna towers 130 feet over a large open-walled assembly pavilion.
The 150-acre Catholic Shrine is dedicated to the Catholic approved Marian apparition that occurred in Fatima, Portugal, in 1917, and her request to three shepherd children to pray the rosary.
The Blue Army, taking its name from the Marian blue, began in the late 1940s and early ’50s as a means to combat communism. An early active member donated his farm to the organization in the 1970s to create the shrine site.
The organization changed its name, and the site is run by World Apostolate of Fatima.
According to shrine materials, the site has several features. One is a replica of the chapel built on the site of the Fatima apparition and another is “an exact replica of the original Holy House,” a Loreto, Italy, structure reported to be the miraculously transported and reconstructed Nazareth home of Mary, Joseph, and Jesus. A wood statue of St. Joseph, as he appeared at Fatima during the Miracle of the Sun, is also located here.
As you continue, you’ll come closer to the structure and notice various statues of religious themes stationed around the meeting hall. Several are by contemporary polish artist Maksymilian Biskupski. That includes a statue of a crucified Christ rising from a tree stump and a “Cross of Reconciliation,’’ whose base is covered with reaching hands.
Just past a small chapel, you’ll follow the road to the entrance to the rosary garden. The rosary is a prayer tool consisting of an arranged cord of beads that guide the practitioner through a series of prayers and help individuals mediate on three specific Christian mysteries: the Joyous, events related to Christ’s arrival; the Sorrowful, related to Christ’s crucifixion; and the Glorious, Christ and Mary’s glorification and the arrival of the Holy Spirit.
The Blue Army’s garden — or path through the woods — uses three different sculpture approaches. The first employs brightly painted life-size figures in set-like arrangements, such as Mary and Joseph finding Jesus in the temple. The second are deep earth tone emotionally expressive figures — with two having nature as a backdrop and three framed and backed by wooden slats. And the third is a series of small figures in white marble reliefs.
Continue further and there is another path with an arrangement of 14 tall crosses with scenes representing the Stations of the Cross. Other stops include the open chapel, candle devotion center, and other statues, including a Saint Francis Shrine.
The stop-and-see shrine is located on Mountain View Road in Asbury and is free and open to dusk to dawn. www.bluearmy.com.
Mt. Laurel in Burlington County — around 35 miles from the U.S. 1 office — is home to an 88-acre park that features a rosary garden.
The site was the previous home of a Cistercian monastery, where the Italian monks who arrived there in 1961 lived a life of farming and praying on the property that was donated by a farmer to the Diocese of Trenton, which deeded it to the Cistercians.
In addition to the monastery also dedicated to the Lady of Fatima, a parish church was eventually built on the property.
Prior to the establishment of the parish, the monks connected with the community by creating folk or traditional art events, such as using flowers to create large religion-themed floor murals.
Eventually, the art presence became more formal, and sculptors were engaged to create the 15 sets of figures that populate the rosary garden situated around a pond.
When the number of monks dwindled in the mid-2010s, the abbot based in Casamari, Italy, sold the property to Mount Laurel Township in 2018 as an open space.
One of the provisions of the sale was that the rosary garden and the former monastery home, called Fatima House, be preserved for historical reasons.
To meet that requirement, provide a source of maintenance funding, and address issues related to separation of church and state, a nonprofit Friends of the Cistercian Monastery was formed to operate and manage the rosary park.
Similar to the Blue Army Shrine garden, the presentation includes free-standing life-sized figures as well as reliefs. The major difference is that the works are unpainted white marble. A few of the works are also signed and trace the classical figures to two companies in Carrara, Italy: Pedrini Sculpture and Bernardi Marmi.
Our Lady of Fatima Rosary Garden, 564 Walton Avenue, Mount Laurel.
The National Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa outside Doylestown, Pennsylvania, also has a rosary garden.
The active religious site, about 50 miles away, is also dedicated to the Madonna — venerated in the form of a reproduction of an icon painting important to the Polish community.
The approximately 170-acre site features a two-leveled church that houses the icon, immense stained glass walls, statuary, and the resting place of the heart of Poland’s first president, pianist, Ignacy Jan Paderewsk.
Also on the grounds are a votive candle chapel and a cemetery featuring a massive work by the New Jersey-based Polish sculptor Andrezej Pitynski.
The shrine was the dream of a Polish priest who arrived in the United States 1951. After petitioning the Vatican and the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, he was given permission to use the diocese-owned land.
By 1955, a chapel had been built and a shrine was established and immediately became popular with pilgrims, mostly Polish Americans who participated in funding efforts to establish the current facility.
In addition to the thousands who have made a journey there, it has attracted several United States presidents and two visits by the future Pope John Paul II, who as pope blessed and signed the icon.
The rosary garden, dedicated by the archbishop of Krakow in 2008, begins at an archway and leads visitors on a long path with stations of massive classically carved stone sculptures. And as communications with shrine leaders proved, the sculptors associated with the effort are unknown.
American Czestochowa, 654 Ferry Road, Doylestown, Pennsylvania. www.czestochowa.us.
With sites closer than one thinks, a visit to any or all of the above may just be a soul lifting or just a safe but different type of outing during a time when we’re still dealing with the uncertainties of a pandemic.
