Europe, Monuments of a Living Faith
by Zsolt Aradi
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In all thy thousand images we salute thee
Claim and acclaim on all thy thousand thrones.
--G.K. Chesterton, "The Black Virgin."
It is futile to attempt to divide the shrines to the Virgin in Europe into categories. There are no major and no minor shrines as far as their spiritual significance is concerned. Greatness in the case of these holy places can be measured in terms of the devotion of the individuals who love and confide in Mary. And Europe, despite the innumerable wars, revolutions, civil strifes and clashes of ideas remained faithful to her. Sometimes it was and is the genuine grateful love for the Great Lady. Henry Adams expresses this in his "Prayer to the Virgin of Chartres":
For centuries I brought you all my cares;
And vexed you with the murmurs of a child;
You heard the tedious burden of my prayers;
You could not grant them, but at least you smiled.
At times the veneration was like a desperate cry, a last attempt for hope.
Ah! when everything fails you, and misery presses you ill,
Come to the Church and look to the Mother of God, and be still!
--Paul Claudel, "Our Lady Help of Christians."
Thus, the peoples at the heartland of Western Civilization turned to her and according to their different traditions, costumes and racial backgrounds created in a thousand different forms dwelling places to the Virgin. It is almost as if each nation, city or village wanted to make her house the most beautiful.
From the Urals to the Atlantic, from Scandinavia and the Baltic to the Mediterranean, Mary watches over the nations, for in her eyes all are equal; from magnificent cathedrals and small road shrines; from the tops of mountains and the shores of the ocean; from the altars of silent old cathedrals and from the walls of modern houses in the busy and noisy streets. The veneration of Mary in Europe has become part of the landscape. Thousands of churches mainly Catholic and Orthodox, but Protestant also, are called Mary's or St. Mary's. There is a real unity of Europe expressed in this devotion to the Great Lady. In the long line of millions who pay homage are to be found those who, though generally skeptics, bow their heads before her. One can call miraculous the unceasing flow of devotion, the building of cathedrals, the creation of great masterpieces of art she has inspired in believer and unbeliever in Europe.
The shrines described here are but a reflection of the radiant and manifold devotion with which the peoples and nations of Europe venerate the "Woman Clothed With the Sun."
The Shrine Built by the Poorest
The Comforter of the Afflicted
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