Content area
Full Text
It rests at the lake's edge, framed by banana trees and square archways: a Chinese sarcophagus believed to be 1,000 years old. Its white stone exterior is carved with dragons. Inside lie the ashes of one of the great crusaders for peace, Mohandas Gandhi.
This tranquil spot seems to some to be deeply filled with mystical forces.
"Every place has got an energy of its own," says Bobette Stanbridge, who sits on a stone bench in the solitude of the adjoining garden. "When you have a place like this, so continually blessed by prayers and meditation, the energy is very powerful."
Years ago, Stanbridge was married here, at the Lake Shrine meditation gardens in Pacific Palisades--a union that eventually failed. Despite that, she returns whenever moved by a certain longing. The trip takes an hour from her home in Oxnard, but it is a small inconvenience for the chance to find solace.
And after the horrors of New York City and the Pentagon, she wants solace for all.
"I'm here to spend the whole day in meditation and prayer . . . for the world," the 52-year-old says softly. "There's so much darkness. There's so much anger and disconnection from God."
For long moments, eyes closed, she sits as still as the trees. Lake Shrine was created for that--for looking inward. The 10-acre gardens are lush and moist and quiet as the autumn sunlight. Sounds seem all but swallowed up in the foliage and steep surrounding hillsides, which form a bowl around the spring-fed lake and gardens.
On Sunset Boulevard near Pacific Coast Highway, Lake Shrine is so inconspicuous from the road that...