SEDALIA — Patty McDonough used to go to Sanctuary Center in Sedalia often with her friend Leigh Fenton to commune and have spiritual discussions.
Since Fenton died four years ago, McDonough still goes, though not as often, and she feels it’s easier to remember her friend there.
“Life goes on. Even when it feels like it’s no fun without your friends and you wonder if it’s worth the bother, life goes on, and we remember being there together,” McDonough said.
McDonough, who lives near Sedalia, is one of countless people who have visited the garden and spiritual getaway at 3720 W. Wolfensberger Road since it opened to the public in 2004.
Like all people who come to the meditative and spiritual garden park, she heard about it through word of mouth: Jack and Sue Pfeiffer, the founders and owners of the property, don’t have a website or advertise.
They like what they have started so much the retired couple wants to make sure it’s there in perpetuity. Last year, they got the property under their nonprofit designated as open space.
“So what happens when Jack and I can’t do this anymore and our kids would like to do it and give it to another nonprofit — what’s the protection?” Sue Pfeiffer said.
To ensure it stays the way it is, they have formed a board, largely made up of their children, who want to keep the property in the family.
“We are all involved in that place, and not just the board has been involved, but all of our family,” said son and board member Chris Pfeiffer. “So we certainly want to continue to keep it in its wonderful state and make it available to the community for years to come.”
The many trees, plants, shrubs and flowers will be maintained by the Douglas County Master Gardeners, said Kate Kator, the master gardener overseeing the project at Sanctuary Center.
“It’s a local park for having a chance to contemplate and enjoy solitude,” Kator said. “It’s more of a park that would be like that than one would go to for exercise, although people do that and have yoga classes.”
While the center is not only for spiritual purposes, that was the original intent, Sue Pfeiffer said.
“We feel that everyone has a spiritual part to them. Everyone has a different way of expressing it and finding that quiet space we all need in their lives,” she said. “Yes, we are spiritual, but we’re not saying you have to be a certain type, you don’t have to be a Christian or a Buddhist or any of those.”
The site features different spiritual symbols and figures, like statutes of the Lady of Guadalupe and St. Francis of Assisi, the wheel of life, a medicine wheel, wishing trees and the labyrinth as its anchor. The labyrinth is a kind of a maze without walls lined with stones, which is 50 feet in diameter but about a third of a mile to walk around.
“It’s a good way to clear your brain. Some people use it to solve problems, some people use it to quiet their mind, some people just walk it to see what happens,” Pfeiffer said.
Whatever one’s experience at the park, the Pfeiffers have welcomed them all. The building on the property that holds their library of self-help, spiritual, art, philosophy and other books, opens at 6 a.m. and closes at 8 p.m. every day. They do get the occasional party-goers who leave beer bottles or cans; the Pfeiffers left a note asking them to take their partying elsewhere.
Sue Pfeiffer has been surprised at how respectful people have been.
“This is a grand social experiment,” she said. “You hope that’s the way people are and that they will take ownership themselves, and that has turned out to be true.”
Clayton Woullard: 303-954-2953, cwoullard@denverpost.com or twitter.com/yhclayton
