Planting a Faith Garden

There’s something irresistible about plant names. I don’t mean formal botanical nomenclature, though that can tell its own fascinating stories, but the folk terms, the little nicknames, that get given to plants because someone happened to look down and notice a confection of foliage around his feet and say, “What is that thing? It looks like X.”

My own favorite plant is called alternately “false dragonhead” or “obedient plant,” the latter because apparently it won’t drop its flowers when you move it. In general, however, obedience is the last thing on its mind.

Last summer, when we moved, I tore a little clump of it out of the garden I was leaving and stuck it in the corner of a flowerbed here, and already it’s up, not only in the spot where I’d originally planted it, but in three or four other places as well. If I didn’t like it so much, I’d say it was metastatic, because that’s how it spreads. If you plant it at all, soon enough you’re going to have it everywhere.

For most of the growing season it makes a graceless-enough addition to the landscaping. The gawky stems, with their serrated leaves sticking straight out, cluster self-consciously together like a bunch of seventh-grade girls about to do calisthenics. But in September, when the rest of the garden lies wan and prostrate in the Indian-summer heat, the obedient plant crowns itself with elegant pale-purple spikes, and I remember why I don’t mind its taking over the world, as it surely intends to do.



Thinking of the obedient plant made me wonder whether there are other plants named, ironically or not, after virtues. The thought struck me that while I’ve heard of love gardens, and Shakespeare gardens, and moon gardens, I’d never heard of a faith garden, and I decided to go trolling around for plants to put in one.

Enter a company called Glasshouse Works, which has obviously read my mind. Are you ready for this? They have a whole collection called “I’m Gittin’ Religion,” featuring both tropical and winter-hardy species with religious-themed names.

There are the biblically-named varieties: Moses-in-the-boat, Joseph’s Coat, Star of Bethlehem, Crown of Thorns.

There are the ecclesiastical plants: Chalice Vine, Lenten Rose, Rosary Vine, and the striking Bishop’s Cap Cactus, which would more properly be called the Biretta Plant.



Of course, you could plan an interfaith garden grouping some of the above with Buddhist Pine and Bodhi Tree (would the Bishop’s Cap then start extolling the wonders of the contemplative traditions of the Far East?). Or — and I don’t know why you would do this, but you could — you could grow a diabolical garden full of Voo Doo bulbs, Devil’s Backbone, and Devil’s Walking Stick.

Actually, I’ve grouped these completely haphazardly, so that in order to grow them together, you’d have to have several different climate zones in one flower bed, but in theory, at least, these gardens would be interesting.

In reality, the Glasshouse Works people will help you select five plants from this large collection which will best suit your climate conditions.

Looks good to me.

[Rating: 90/100]