Maryknoll Memorial Garden Circle Dedicated

On the feast day of Our Lady of Guadalupe this past Saturday, a memorial garden circle to remember Father Daniel P. Jensen, M.M., was blessed during a ceremony at Mission St. Teresa’s Residence for senior missioners on the grounds of the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers in Ossining. Father Jensen of Greenwich, Connecticut, died during 2013 at the age of 77. He had been a Maryknoll priest for 51 years.

Father Jensen served throughout Latin America during his years in mission. The dedication ceremony was arranged to occur on the special Mexican feast day associated with a venerated image enshrined within the Minor Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City.

For years, Father Jensen had wanted to “flower up” the circle at the primary entrance to Mission St. Teresa’s Residence, where he had lived during the last several years of his life. When he had served as director of Maryknoll’s senior residence in Los Altos, California, before he returned to Maryknoll in Ossining, Father Jensen had initiated the same care for the grounds on that property.

“Having witnessed his compassionate concern of those he worked with and for in Guatemala, I felt I knew his driving force that seemed to guide him so well in touching people heart to heart,” said Father Joseph La Mar, M.M., who blessed the ground for the memorial garden. “Almost upon his arrival and even before he entered St. Teresa’s, he spoke of fixing up this 42-foot circle in the manner as he had done at Los Altos. I am told by one of his nurses that he kept talking about his dream work until he got to the point of expressing disappointment that he could not take on the work. He had said that ‘I’m afraid I will be going to heaven with the disappointment of not having fixed up the circle.’”

About two years after Father Jensen’s death, Maryknoll was able to move forward with his dream and to name the replanted ground the Father Dan Jensen Memorial Circle.

“Since Dan’s death, I thought fulfilling his dream would be a wonderful memorial for him,” added Father La Mar. “Many of us supported the cost of completing this wonderful work. We planted the area with flowering bushes and trees, and provided seating to enjoy a place in silent comfort circling the statue of Mary holding her divine Son in her arms.”

The statue was turned to allow Mary’s face to gaze upon the building to express her concern for all those who live and work at Mission St. Teresa’s Residence. At her feet are the words: “As I embrace my own son so I embrace all of you living in St. Teresa.”

Mission Work In Latin America

Father Jensen attended St. Catherine of Siena Grammar School in Riverside, Connecticut. Following graduation from Fairfield Preparatory High School, he entered Maryknoll at the Junior Seminary (Venard) in Clarks Summit, Pennsylvania. He held a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Maryknoll College in Glen Ellyn, Illinois, and a master’s degree in religious education from the Maryknoll Seminary.

After his ordination on June 9, 1962, Father Jensen was assigned to Guatemala, where he served as assistant in the Parish of San Miguel Acatan in the Diocese of Huehuetenango. During 1965, he was transferred to the Parish of Santa Eulalia, where he served as pastor for six years.

During 1979, due to impending violence, Father Jensen was transferred to Guatemala City. Soon after, he received assignments in Costa Rica and the U.S. When Father Jensen returned to Latin America during 1986, he was assigned to a Guatemalan refugee camp in Campeche, Mexico, to serve the people who had fled military persecution in their home country.

“Mission is not taking Jesus overseas,” said Father Jensen many years ago, “but it is discovering the footprints of God across the history of the people we serve. For example, the Mayan people do not have a word for holy, because everything is holy. They have a sense of reverence and a feeling of awe before the presence of God in all creation.”

Photographs by Brother Andrew Marsolek, M.M., and Mike Virgintino