26th Jul - OUR MOTHER OF GRACE (ITALY)

 In 1672 the Blessed Virgin told a shepherd boy that she wished to be venerated at a certain place in the beech woods near Castelluccio in central Italy, 

    whereupon the child discovered a terracotta Madonna affixed to one of the trees there. The 7" Madonna of the Beech was moved to a wayside shrine, and then, 

    in 1722, to its own mountain sanctuary. Until 1964 a caretaker lived in the hermitage there. Since then a volunteer opened the Chapel only in summer on Sundays. 

    In 1975 the sacred image was stolen and replaced with a copy. Since 1756, an annual pilgrimage on Ascension Day brings the image to the town and back again, 

    and on St. Anne's feast day, July 26, a procession goes to the site of the beech tree, recently fallen. The sanctuary's holy card doesn't seem to depict the terracotta image. 

    It may represent one of the paintings of Lorenzo Pranzini, who decorated the interior of the chapel in the 1800s.




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