December 19, 2024

We revere Lord Jesus. His image graces every SRF altar in temples, ashrams, and meditation centers all over the world. Our beloved Guru Paramahansa Yoganandaji’s 2-volume Second Coming of Christ devotes more than 1,000 pages to his life and teachings. Jesus’s picture also graces literally thousands upon thousands of devotees’ home altars.

And—this is really important—Jesus holds a special place in our hearts and minds. Every devotee knows that we strive to manifest the consciousness of Christ in our daily lives.

Christ, Sculpted in Bronze

With Christmas season upon us, it seems appropriate to give some attention to the other construction project currently underway at Greenfield—a sacred meditation garden that pays special homage to our beloved Jesus.

The focal point of this new garden is an original, bronze statue of Jesus Christ blessing a couple of children, also sculpted in bronze.

Created by nationally-renowned sculptor and stone carver Malcolm Harlow, this set of 3 statues was especially commissioned just for Greenfield. It’s one of a kind.

Harlow garnered national recognition as an artist in stone during his many years of work in the National Cathedral in Washington DC. You may well have seen another of his statues. He  sculpted the statue of a George Washington that stands in front of the George Washington Office Museum in Winchester, VA.

Heavy Statues, Heavy Lifting

It should come as no surprise that bronze statues weigh a LOT. Moving these three statues into place required heavy lifting, not to mention a good deal of preliminary work—picking just the right spot in the garden, constructing cement platforms that will permanently anchor the statues in their new home, and some seriously careful maneuvering of the forklift. Harlow was here at Greenfield for some of the action.

The work to create this new meditation garden is already well underway—designing, planning, seeking Master’s guidance in creating the beauty that is to come. So far, only spring bulbs have been planted.  But a good deal of work has already been done to facilitate access to the garden. If you stand behind the garage and look down the hill, you’ll see new gravel paths and a couple of beautiful new wooden bridges.

Feel free to walk down and take a look around.  Do realize, however, that the garden is still a work in progress.

Once benches, custom-tiled by one of our talented SRF members, are installed and plantings are in place and in bloom, this new garden promises to be a very special place for prayer and meditation under the open sky.

November 26, 2024

Construction continues on our Greenfield Chapel. Last week, soggy weather slowed things down, and what did happen was mostly underground and almost invisible.

Workers applied waterproofing to the foundation and installed some of the underground plumbing. Next step after plumbing is inspected will be installing the ground floor slab, which will also need to be inspected.

Devotees will be happy to know that Greenfield has its very own inspector on the job!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Master’s Greenfield devotees have so much to be thankful for. May your Thanksgiving holiday be filled with light, love, and Divine Mother’s blessings.

Here is the latest construction video.

And here is a playlist of all construction videos.

November 18, 2024

No movement at all for months, followed by rapid dramatic progress for several weeks… That’s an apt description of how our Greenfield Chapel construction project got underway.

Now what?

Construction is ongoing, dampened somewhat by a couple of soggy, rainy days. The foundation walls and the steel beams that support the main floor are now complete and in place.

Back to the Earth

A  few things need to take place before the concrete floor slab gets poured:

Plumbing. Pipes to drain away all the waste water from the building’s sinks and toilets will be installed next. That means that workers will be back—you guessed it—digging in the ground directly under the spot where the new chapel is already starting to take shape.

Inspection. Once the underground preparations are completed, these need to be inspected. Construction plans call for that to take just one day.

Tending to the Sacred. This, from Sister Brahmani: “Mother Center has given us some soil from sacred places – Babaji’s cave, Mother Center, Encinitas, Lake Shrine, and Hollywood Temple. We will sprinkle this into the foundation area before the slab is poured.”

After the slab is poured and inspected, all the action will again move above ground where we can more easily watch the progress as it unfolds.

With Thanksgiving holidays ahead of us, construction will slow somewhat. Please do remember that we have a LOT be thankful for as we sit down to our celebratory meals. After years of planning and eager anticipation, construction on our new Greenfield Chapel is well underway and still on target, if winter weather cooperates, to reach completion sometime in the Fall of 2025.

Here is the latest construction video.

And here is a playlist of all construction videos.

November 8, 2024

Foundation Nearing Completion

Suddenly, it’s there: Progress! After weeks of looking at earth being moved and holes being dug and cement being poured into holes, we’re now watching an actual building starting to take shape.

Over the past several days, work crews have laid the foundation walls--cinder blocks soon to be filled with cement and reinforced with rebar.

If you want to feel good about what’s going on at Greenfield, give thanks and take a moment to enjoy the latest construction video.

October 29, 2024

Really Digging It

They’re at it again. Once again—after a pause that lasted almost three weeks—construction workers returned to Greenfield. Again, the air was rent with the sounds of heavy machinery leveling the ground, digging holes for the new chapel’s footings and foundation.

And (finally!) the actual substance of our new Greenfield Chapel was quite literally poured into all those carefully prepared holes. Click on this link to a time lapse video of all the action last week on the building site.

Why the pause? On October 4, the first day of actual construction, builders discovered a problem involving the alignment of drainage pipes and the chapel’s foundation. Adjusting the depth of the foundation required an engineer’s input and paperwork that needed Greenfield’s attention.

That’s all been taken care of. Let’s face it, if you’re going to find a problem, it’s a good thing to have it happen on day one and not further along in the construction process. (Fortunately, the required changes were not of the kind requiring county approval.)