Vysoká nad Kysucou, September 18, 2022. In the first Biblical Garden in Kysuce Region, on Sunday, the memory of Her Late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II was publicly honored for the last time by planting a rose of the ‘Queen Elizabeth’ variety. After the establishment of the Žilina place of worship in the Carl Gustav Swensson Park near Her Majesty’s Platinum Jubilee tree, this is the second place in the Žilina Region that is connected to the former British Queen through a plant. During her lifetime, the Queen planted many commemorative trees in different parts of the world and loved gardens and parks.
The Biblical Garden was blessed during the feast festivities in Vysoká nad Kysucou after the feast holy mass by the feast preacher, the economist of the Žilina Diocese Peter Dubec. On the occasion of the 250th anniversary of the founding of the Vysoká nad Kysucou Parish, the rose was planted by Marek Sobola, Secretary-General of Servare et Manere, which covers the international Peace Tree project. The ‘Queen Elizabeth’ variety is a pink Grandiflora rose cultivar, bred by rose grower, Dr. Walter Lammerts in the United States in 1954. This rose variety is very popular worldwide and has won numerous awards, including “World’s Favorite Rose” in 1979. On the occasion of the planting of the rose, Servare et Manere together with the Parish Office issued a heptagonal commemorative stamp with a portrait of the Queen, symbolizing the 70 years of Her Majesty’s reign.
The idea of the Biblical Garden arose during the COVID-19 pandemic, at a time of the strictest anti-pandemic measures, including the curfew. In an atmosphere of silence, solitude and social isolation, garden work began to grow in the vicinity of the Parish in Vysoká. It is a themed garden with trees and shrubs mentioned in the Bible, including all the trees of paradise and the most important plants of the Holy Land. The first addition to the Garden was planted in May 2020, which reflected the global situation at the time, and as the very first tree in the world was named “the COVID-19 Tree of Peace“. Summer oak in the rare variety ‘Jan Zamoyski’ replaced the destroyed linden in front of the Church of St. Matthew the Apostle and will thus commemorate events that affected the whole world. The second plant in the Biblical Garden, which, in addition to the Bible, is connected to an important global event is the aforementioned Jubilee rose in the ‘Queen Elizabeth’ cultivar, planted the day before the Queen’s funeral. The flora of the Biblical Garden in Vysoká nad Kysucou creates an imaginary trefoil arboretum with an accent on biblical trees, a rosary and an orchard.
Local media as well as the Press Office of the Bishops’ Conference of Slovakia reported on this reverent act.
