History of the Peace Garden

In 1999, the Hamilton Wentworth Catholic District School Board requested that as a family of schools, each school plan and implement a permanent symbol of our transition into the new millennium, named the Millennium Project. In response to this request, our Parent Council developed and installed our Peace Garden. It was completed and blessed by Father Mahoney in September 2002.

However, our garden would soon become more than just a marker for the millennium. Sadly, we lost three of our students to cancer, and our garden became a beautiful memorial space, honoring these children with stones placed, in their name, in our garden. 

As the garden has sat in quiet repose it has weathered many changes to its face, including the move of out of our old school and into the new and the construction of the new church. At one time, consideration was even made to relocate the garden, but happily it has remained in its original place. We are blessed with this beautiful space and all the love that is in it, and now it is time to love it back.

Our plan is to rejuvenate and expand the garden, refresh the plantings, replace the tile stones with exposed aggregate embedded with our concrete doves, include seating of natural stone to seat a full class and install a large inukshuk at the entrance of the garden. The entire design, from green space to play space, will be planned and developed to embrace and respond to the diversity of all our children, of all abilities and all needs. In addition to the improvements on the garden itself, the project will include an outdoor classroom, a Trail of Tranquility and an interactive play space that will be universally accessable, barrier free and provide all of our students with a place to reflect, learn, pray and play together.