By Joe Bukuras
Burlington, Vt., Jul 1, 2021 / 11:12 am
Our Lady of Ephesus House of Prayer is an exact replica of the Blessed Virgin Mary’s house in Ephesus, where she lived in prayer with St. John in the last years of her life.
“I want everyone to know that our Lord gave us an incredibly gift here in Vermont and hopefully they can come and pray and thank him for it,” said Mary Fraser Tarinelli, the owner of the replica, located in Jamaica, Vt., 120 miles south of Burlington.
The replica, which sits on a 190 acre Catholic prayer ground, is the only one that exists in the United States. It is one of four or five in the world, according to Tarinelli.
Our Lady of Ephesus House of Prayer includes guest rooms, chapels, a shop, a kitchen, a cemetery, a rosary walk, and a prayer monument to Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich.
Tarinelli told CNA she has set up the replica house to be as close to the original as possible. The altar, the pictures on the wall, the stone floor, and the handless and nose chipped Blessed Virgin Mary Statue are all taken from the house in Ephesus.
“I don't think you can get any closer than what we've done here,” Tarinelli said.
Tarinelli’s mother had had what she considered a miraculous experience at Our Lady’s house in Ephesus,
The construction of the replica began in 2002 and was finished in 2006.
Tarinelli contacted to the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington D.C. and requested that an oratory be built in honor of Our Lady of Ephesus.
Getting the approval for an oratory more quickly than she expected, Tarinelli wondered how she would have the money to build the oratory. Tarinelli knew she was “in trouble.”
She called her friends at the American Society of Ephesus, and told them about her situation and they offered to pay for every expense of the oratory. The Our Lady of Ephesus oratory is now located in the back of the crypt church in the shrine.
Tarinelli believes that the Blessed Mother’s intercession brings many people to her house of prayer.
"Anybody that's here is here because the Blessed Mother has brought them here,” she told CNA. “I guarantee you aren't here because of my advertising."
Tarinelli’s vision for the property is for a religious order eventually to live there in order to preserve the replica, the land, and the silence.
