This unusual site in the heart of the inner city of Washington, DC consists of a Romanesque and Byzantine style monastery, church and gardens, built by the Franciscans in 1899 and dedicated to major Christian sites in Europe and the Holy Land.

Included are magnificent flower gardens on the grounds as well as indoor recreations of the ancient Roman catacombs below the church; an outdoor replica of a grotto in Lourdes, France famous for its early 19th century apparition of the Virgin Mary to St. Bernadette; and --built into a hillside of the grounds-- a recreation of a 3rd century grotto chapel near the Garden of Gethsemane in Jerusalem.

To learn more about the Monastery go to www.myfranciscan.org

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