The members of Calvary Episcopal Church invite you to walk the labyrinth. As you walk, you may find your experience is both meditative and metaphorical; beginnings and endings, twists and turns, direction and confusion, form and pattern, youth and age are all suggested; and all within the context of the path of life which our own sense of the Divine gives us. Remember, the labyrinth is not a maze. It is unicursal. There is only one path, clear and true, and it is in no way designed to confuse the walker.

The stone labyrinth in the Calvary Church garden is the creation of Calvary Episcopal Church, upon whose ground it rests. The particular form of this labyrinth is the so called Cretan or classical labyrinth, which is believed to date from as early as the fifth century B.C., in the Mediterranean. Calvary Church has established the labyrinth in this place for the meditation and prayerful benefit of the parish, the general community of Santa Cruz, and visitors. Our hope is that the Calvary labyrinth will give its walkers a quiet location in the midst of downtown for the purpose of "practicing the presence of God."

We are all on a path...exactly where we need to be. The labyrinth is a model of that path. A labyrinth is an ancient symbol that relates to wholeness. It combines the imagery of the circle and the spiral into a meandering but purposeful path. The labyrinth represents a journey into our own center and back again into the world. Labyrinths have long been used as meditation and prayer tools. A labyrinth is an archetype with which we can have direct experience. We can walk it. It is a metaphor for life's journey. It is a symbol that creates sacred space and place and takes us out of our ego into "That Which is Within." In a labyrinth there is only one path. The way in is the way out. There are no blind alleys. A labyrinth is not a maze. The labyrinth path leads you on a circuitous path to the center and out again. The labyrinth is a right brain task. With a labyrinth there is only one choice to be made. The choice is to enter or not. The choice is whether or not to walk a spiritual path. A passive receptive mindset is needed. At its most basic level the labyrinth is a metaphor for the journey to our deepest center and back into the world with a broadened understanding of who we are.