OUR LADY OF THE STAR

Day 177: November 05

Our Lady of the Star, Rotondi, Avellino, Campania, Italy



There are two Madonnas of the Star in Rotondi. The story goes that a wooden statue of the Virgin was found in the Partenio mountains between Rotondi and Avella and was taken to Rotondi, whose sanctuary became a pilgrimage destination, but the citizens of Avella did not stand idly.

Since miraculous powers were attributed to the statue of the Virgin, the citizens of Avella also claimed the statue but their requests were not heard, so they decided to go to Rotondi themselves to take away what they believed to be their property.

In the middle of the night they tried to take away the Statue of the Virgin of the Star. But the hermit, who was in charge of the sanctuary, with the toll of the bells throughout the valley, gave the alarm. The Rotondesi  (the people of Rotondi), to foil the sacrilegious theft, rushed en masse, armed with arquebuses, hoes, tridents and sticks. Firing wildly along the sinister paths and in the gloomy gorges of the mountain, they put the Avellani (the people of Avella) to flight, who during the flight made the statue fall into a ravine overlooking the sanctuary, damaging it.

Since then, the citizens of Rotondi, to thank the Lord for the evaded danger, every year on Easter Sunday morning, while the simulacrum of the Virgin leaves her sanctuary and carried on shoulders descends the steep cliffs, the ancient litany songs are joined by the crackling of the arquebuses that end in the large square of the town, while the Virgin between two wings of the cheering crowd enters the archpriest church of the Holy Assumption (SS. Annunziata).

The old statue of the Madonna was exiled to the Parish Church of the Annunciation, restored in 2014. All that remains is the upper part of the Madonna's body, with the child's head perched on her shoulder.

The Sanctuary of Maria Santissima della Stella (Our Lady of the Star) is located at the foot of the Partenio, 500 meters above sea level. Immersed in the green of the chestnut woods, in a lighthouse position over the surrounding valley, the church appears as a bright white dot.

Originally there was a small chapel dedicated to Our Lady of the Star, which is mentioned in 1599. It was a chapel with a wooden ceiling, a paved floor and walls covered with moisture and cracks.

Thanks to the offering of ten ducats by Michelangelo Leggieri, made on the occasion of the visit to the Sanctuary by Archbishop Orsini for the reconsecration of the altar, it was possible to carry out works completed in 1705, repairing the fissures and humidity indicated above, as well as the damage caused by the earthquakes of 1688 and 1702.

Cardinal Archbishop Orsini, the future Pope Benedict XIII, after consecrating the sanctuary on November 5, 1704, was dismayed by the condition of the ancient statue and decided to give a new image of the Madonna which arrived on August 10, 1705. This statue remained on the altar and was used during processions on feast days.

Between 1885 and 1888, the Sanctuary was restored and the ancient altar was rebuilt, which was brought towards the center of the building, and the Throne of the Madonna which was placed close to the walls, leaning against the walls.

In the first half of the eighteenth century, a series of interventions were carried out on the internal structure of the church, with the renovation of the "Grotto", or the "Cells of the hermits". An uncovered loggia was also built, where the current entrance door facing the valley was opened, with the closure of the original one facing the mountain.

Between 1955 and 1965, behind the Sanctuary, some structures were built to accommodate hermits and faithful and the House of the Madonna was built. The Madonna della Stella also has two festivals. On Easter morning, a procession in costume commemorates the theft. The statue is brought down from the sanctuary, and two days later, on Tuesday, the village is toured, returning to the sanctuary on Sunday. The sequence is repeated again on the first Sunday of August, with the processional tour on August 15, the feast of the Assumption, and the return the following Sunday.


St Justin Russolillo Writes...

"Glory to the Most Blessed Trinity in you, O Mary! Glory to you, O Mary, in the Blessed Trinity, for your fidelity, your submissiveness and your simplicity, for your laboriosity, you mortification and your prayer, for your contemplation, your words and your silences, for your earthly life."

(Ascension, trans. Louis Caputo, Vocationist Fathers, New Jersey, 1997, p. 390) 

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