Walk with Mary throughout the Year

Day 360: May 08 Our Lady of Pompeii, Pompeii, Naples, Italy Bartolo Longo, in his intent to propagate the practice of the Rosary among the Pompeians, went to Naples to buy a painting of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary ( Madonna del Rosario ). The idea was to buy one already seen in a store, but things didn't go that way. By pure chance, in fact, he met Father Radente (his confessor) in Via Toledo who for this purpose suggested that he go to the Conservatory of the Rosary in Portamedina and ask, in his name, to Sister Maria Concetta De Litala for an old painting of the Rosary that he himself had entrusted to her ten years earlier. Bartolo followed this suggestion, but was soon taken by dismay when the nun showed him the painting: a canvas corroded by moths and worn out by time, lacking pieces of color, with Our Lady in an anti-historical attitude, that is, with the Virgin offering the rosary to St Rose, instead of to St Catherine of Siena, as in the Dominican tradition. Bartolo was on t...

Day 359: May 07 The Molchenskaya Icon, Businovo, Russia The story of this miraculous icon came to us through the testimony of Maria Sporysheva, a parishioner of St Sergius' Church in Businovo who had been living in the area for a long time.  In the 17th century, a blind maiden lived in the village of Businovo (near Moscow), in a house on the right bank of the Busynka River. One night the Mother of God appeared to her in a dream and said to her:  "Go along the right side of the river, against the current, to the place I point out to you and you will find one of my Icons." The girl explained the dream to her mother and the next day, they went together along the river. They walked it for about half a kilometer and 100 meters from the shore, they found the exact place indicated by the Virgin.  They began to dig and after a while they found a spring. Following the Virgin's instructions, she washed her eyes with water from the spring and was miraculously healed of blindness...

Day 358: May 06 Our Lady of St John, Sommariva Bosco, Cuneo, Italy A cry full of wonder broke the silence of the quiet morning of May 6, 1685, the second Sunday of Easter "Miracle! I can see it! It attracted the attention of the few people gathered in prayer in front of the majestic image of Our Lady, painted in red, with St John the Baptist and St Anthony the Abbot on the side, on a pylon near Sommariva Bosco, on the road leading to Caramagna. It was the day of the feast of St John at Porta Latina. The notarial deeds, which are in the Archiepiscopal Archives of Turin (Vol. X Codex de Diversis), report the descriptions made before the notary "by the Most Illustrious and Rev Mr Michele Beggiami, by the grace of God and of the Apostolic See Archbishop of Turin, officially delegated", by eyewitnesses. A certain Carlo Antonio Ferrerio, of the "priocha diocese of Asti", on his way to the Sanctuary of the Moretta to fulfill a vow, together with one of his relatives A...

Day 357: May 05 Oue Lady of Europe There are those who have found in the European flag a clear Marian reference and more precisely to the "woman clothed with the sun" of the Apocalypse. But it seems that there are two Marian protectors of Europe, one in the church of "Our Lady of Europe" in Gibraltar, the other in Motta di Madesimo (Italy) 13 meters high and all covered in gold. Each state has its own flag. Europe is not yet a unitary state, but it cultivates the hope that it will become one. However, there is a flag for the European Union (EU). It has a singular history, a little "Marian" history. A few years after the Second World War in 1949, a commission was entrusted with the task of designing the flag of Europe. Its first task was to exclude possible contrasts or similarities too close to the flags of other states, thus avoiding unpleasant accusations of "copying." After long discussions, the following decisions were reached:  The color of ...

Day 356: May 04 Our Lady of the Dove, Montespineto, Stazzano, Alessandria, Italy The first important testimony we have is from 1155, when, on the occasion of the campaign of the German emperor Frederick Barbarossa against Tortona, one of the armies hired by the emperor, went as far as Stazzano, sacking it, setting it on fire and sword and razing to the ground the village and the nearby castle of Serravalle. The inhabitants of the village then left their homes and, to escape the fury of the soldiery, took shelter on the heights of the mountain, then known as Monte Arimanno, recommending their escape to the Blessed Virgin Mary Mother of God. Their pleas were heard, and the protection they received was equally evident. When the enemy troops withdrew, the people of Stazzano wanted to build a small chapel on the hill, in honor of Our Lady of the Mountain who had protected them in that dramatic situation. This was the first chapel in the place dedicated to Our Lady. Later, over the years, gi...

Day 355: May 03 Our Lady of the Three Ears of Corn, Trois-Epis, Colmar, Haut-Rhin, Alsace, France On May 3, 1491 at 10 am, as described in the chronicle of Thann, Thierry Schoéré, a blacksmith from Orbey, on his way to the market of Niedermorschwihr, (a French commune of 580 inhabitants located in the department of Haut-Rhin in the Alsace region) near Colmar, passed in front of a large oak tree where he observed a holy image deposited, according to the local custom, to invite passers-by to pray for a man who had died a few days earlier. Dismounting from his horse, he knelt before the pious image and began to pray fervently for the soul of the unfortunate man, when he was suddenly blinded by a ray of light, in the midst of which appeared a delicate and vaporous form.  It was the Virgin Mary, wrapped in white transparent veils, who had three ears of corn in her right hand and a small piece of ice in her left hand. "Get up, good man," said the Virgin gently, "and listen.  M...