Looking around at the life-sized sculptures, 8-year-old Xavier McKeown, from Sleepy Eye, Minnesota, was impressed.
“It’s really cool how the artist made everything so big and detailed,” he observed.
Welcome to Reflection Park.
McKeown was there with his mother and three younger siblings the day the Register visited. “My family prays the Rosary every day during May and October,” he said. “It brings the Sorrowful Mysteries to life like you are walking with Jesus.”
After driving for miles on country roads alongside wide open fields, a 34-foot bronze crucifix at the intersection of County Highway 19 and Highway 5 comes into view. It is 4 miles outside the small town of Vesta, Minnesota, and 130 miles southwest of Minneapolis. Most travelers are on their way to somewhere else.
Many pull in, curious or attracted by the power of the image. But more and more people arrive intentionally as word spreads.
The park is the creation of Michael Dolan. He began the project in 2016 when he had the large crucifix commissioned and erected on the edge of a field on his 640-acre farm. He grew up in
