OUR LADY OF GRONDICI

Day 264: January 31

Our Lady of Grondici, Tavernelle di Panicale, Perugia, Umbria



The sanctuary that houses it was erected following the resurrection of a child, hence the name "Grondici" which derives from "suggrunda": eaves or canopy that the Romans indicated as the tomb of children under 40 days of life. Children who died without baptism were taken here.

The Grondici, which gave its name to the Sanctuary, is a locality a few kilometers from Tavernelle, in the municipality of Panicale (Perugia) and takes its name from the Latin term sub grunda, under the eaves (of the roof), a place chosen to lay infants who died before baptism, and here to call them in a temporary resurrection in order to administer the sacrament of baptism and have a worthy burial.

According to medieval theology, children who died without baptism were destined for limbo and had no right to be buried in a consecrated place, but their little bodies were placed next to the house where they were born, precisely "sub grunda".

Like many other Shrines, this one in the Grondici was erected, with the offerings of the devotees and the faithful, above a Marian shrine, to which two parents had brought their son, who had suffocated to death immediately after birth, to obtain the miracle of the resurrection.

From an initial country shrine to a real (small) sanctuary, the step is short! Inside it there must have been a first votive image of the Virgin Mary. With the passage of time and as a result of a growing devotion, this was replaced or simply flanked by a new and larger image (Processional Banner) commissioned in 1495 by Friar Matteo to Gregory Teutonic, which portrayed a Majesty holding the child Jesus in her arms, portrayed between Saints Sebastian and Rocco who are venerated inside the sanctuary. On the image we the date of January 31st.

The presence of St Roch and St Sebastian, protectors against the plague, underlines that at the time the role of sanctuary was secondary to that of protection against the plague especially during the epidemic that scourged the region in 1495.

Later the sanctuary of Our Lady of Grondici became "multi-therapeutic", but it always remained the sanctuary of fertility, so much so that even today sterile women and mothers who need protection for their children resort to it.

The devotion of the Sanctuary remains unchanged over the centuries. The local community managed this holy place as best they could. Hermit friars (both lay people and priests) or tenant custodians alternated over the years, establishing a pious and devout community of followers around the Sanctuary.


St Justin Russolillo Writes...

"We unite ourselves, O Mary, to the Saints, to the Angels and especially to your parents, Joachim and Anne, to your Spouse, Saint Joseph, bowing to you while we greet you on behalf of the Blessed Trinity, full of grace in the Mystery and in the Privilege of our Immaculate conception, O Mary."

(Justin Russolillo, Spirit of Prayer, trans. Louis Caputo, Vocationist Fathers, Newark, 1996, pp. 155-156)

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