Conservation, religious groups work to prevent development on available religious lands

August 11, 2010
By Jay Lindsay 
Associated Press

WAREHAM, Mass. (AP) — The stretch of shoreline owned by a Massachusetts religious order is a place where even the sounds add to the stillness. Bells jangle on buoys as birds chatter and the tide slides in a soft rush past scattered clammers.

“It’s a refuge of silence,” said the Rev. Stan Kolasa, director of a retreat center on the Buzzards Bay property. “It’s holy. This is holy ground.”