Notre Dame de Brebières, Albert, Picardy, France
Legend has it that a shepherd, exasperated by the ride of one of his ewes who frolicked regularly out of the herd, rage, struck his staff on the ground. Suddenly, he heard a voice asking him to stop, because ” he was hurting her .” He dug, dug, and exhumed a statue of the Virgin, who was nicknamed ‘the Madonna with the sheep’.
On this site, an oratory is built, which becomes a Marian place of worship more and more frequented. In the Middle Ages, the pilgrimage dedicated to Our Lady of Brebières, ‘Our Lady with the sheep’, took place on September 8, but, on a daily basis, the faithful flocked. The parish church, built on the site oratory at the beginning of the XVIII th century becomes too small, especially when the altar of the Virgin, located in a chapel of the Benedictine priory, abandoned after the fires and the ravages of the XVII th century, is transferred to the new church.
The affluence is such that Pope Leo XIII , who grants him the title of minor basilica in 1901, describes it as ” Lourdes of the North “.
Anicet Godin, priest of Albert from 1882, in front of the growing reputation of the building, and because the city grew strongly thanks to the industrial revolution, decides to replace the church by a big and beautiful basilica.
Visit France. Epic French Culture & Adventure Route © All Rights Reserved | Monika & Simon Newbound 2018
Own or work here?
