The Garden at the end of June

Today, on the last day of June, the roses are beginning to go over. They've been lovely this month, but the recent wind and rain has left them bedraggled. Their beauty is fleeting, as human beauty is, and we must enjoy it while we may, and look forward to beauty yet to come...

A full blown David Austen rose
- but who can tell me which one?

Another blousy yellow rose fading to pink

Rambling roses bedecking the espallier pear trees
- Belvedere, Veilchenblau, American Pillar

Belvedere is rather too vigorous, but what a show!

There is so much else in the garden too. Marty's labyrinth garden is particularly good this year, thanks to Geraldine the gardener who manages it for her.

Daylilies and Penstemon 'Purple Bedder' burning brightly
as the blue Lupins fade out

Philadelphus 'Belle Etoile'

The whole garden is delightfully scented by Philadelphus 'Belle Etoile'. And since we had the sceptic tank pumped out it no longer has to compete with other fragrances!

Perennial Foxgloves

We have two forms of perenial foxgloves, a larger one and a smaller one. The bees love them both, but the smaller ones frustrate the large bumble bees which can't fit their bodies inside the finger. But something does manage to polinate them, because they are spreading all about.

Blue Delphinium spires

The Delphiniums are just going over. Which reminds me I must ask Geraldine to leave some heads so that I can save the seed.

Anthemis 'Grallagh Gold' with Salvia 'Hot Lips'

Marty also has raised beds in the back for a cutting garden, and it too is splendid this year. Here we can see a real local which should be much more widely known and grown - 'Grallagh Gold'. It originated as a chance seedling in the garden at Grallagh, just outside Nenagh, where Mrs McCutcheon propogated it from cuttings. I was generously given some by one of her descendents.

And finally we come to my part of the garden which I fear is terribly overgrown this year. I might claim to have been a good eco-warrior following a no-mow-May policy, but in truth I have just been unable to keep up with rampant growth. My age is telling on me, and I am becoming over-blown and blousy like the roses! But I am pleased at the way the wild flowers continue to do their thing in the Willow Border. Here you can see white Yarrow, purple Greater Knapweed, blue Meadow Cranesbill, and pink Red Campion.

Wildflowers in the Willow Border

God in the Garden in April

This article appeared in the April 2022 issue of Newslink, the diocesan magazine for Limerick and Killaloe, part of the United Diocese of Tuam, Limerick & Killaloe. Photos by Joc Sanders

Soft pink flowers of Magnolia 'Leonard Messel'

Usually at this time of year my spirits are high as I watch the new life of Spring accelerate away. But this year is different – my spirits are low. A part of God’s wider garden is being ripped apart as I write in mid-March. We are watching the crucifixion of the people of Ukraine. The news is full of images of wrecked apartment buildings, images of men saying goodbye to weeping wives and children fleeing as refugees, images of men and women in uniform preparing to kill other men and women in any way they can.

Ordinary people and governments here in Ireland and throughout Europe are responding with extraordinary generosity, collecting goods and money to help Ukrainian refugees and to provide humanitarian aid. But images of destruction and refugees from wars in Syria, Yemen and Ethiopia have not elicited quite the same generous response. Is it because the disaster in Ukraine is happening close to us in Europe, to people who look so much like us? Are we unduly partial in our response?

Meanwhile, NATO Governments seem intent to feed just enough weapons into Ukraine to keep the fighting going, to weaken Russia without risking a wider, even more destructive war, possibly a nuclear one. We do not know how this war will end, but we do know that the economic sanctions already imposed will make life difficult for us all, not just in Russia, but here in Ireland and throughout the world.

We see evil manifested in Russia’s attack on Ukraine, but it is not the Russian people who are evil, any more than the Ukrainian people are. As Christians, we must pray not just for the people of Ukraine, but also of Russia, and for an early negotiated peace. We must pray for the leaders of Ukraine and Belarus, of Russia and NATO, that hard and warlike hearts may be softened, that they are led into God’s paths of peace and justice. And we must pray for grace for ourselves to resist evil and do God’s will.

Yet, as well as evil there is hope in God’s garden. Evil will not triumph in the end. Easter will soon be with us, bringing a triumphant resurrection. Our fields and gardens are burgeoning. In April we will see the victory of life over death re-enacted once again in the growth of our crops, the blooming of fruit trees and the beauty of flowers. Here are a few images taken last April in the garden I share with my wife Marty, where God is always to be found.

A yellow tree peony sheds light in a shady corner

Cherry blossom opens before the leaves

Red and yellow Apeldoorn tulips naturalised in grass