ASIA/INDIA - Vailankanni, the Indian Shrine where everyone experiences Mary's motherhood

New Delhi (Agenzia Fides) - India is preparing for the great Marian feast celebrated at the Shrine of Velankanni in the state of Tamil Nadu. Every year this Marian shrine is visited by millions of pilgrims, half of whom are non-Christians. In honor of the Virgin Mary, who appeared here in the 16th century, a great feast is celebrated that lasts for nine days: from August 29 to September 8. On the occasion of these celebrations, the Prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernàndez, sent a letter to the Bishop of Tanjore, Sagayaraj Thamburaj, expressing Pope Francis's appreciation for this place rich in faith, which is also accessible to non-Christians. In fact, it is not uncommon to come across processions of Hindu pilgrims who come to the Marian shrine carrying a flowered bamboo bowl in which to burn incense.
Arriving in front of the golden statue of the Virgin, they prostrate themselves before her and pray to her alongside the Christian faithful.
"The traditions collected in this precious place of veneration about some of the Virgin's encounters with poor and sick children are beautiful," writes the Cardinal. "Here the tenderness and closeness of Mary that Jesus wanted to leave us as the mother of all is manifested". The Virgin is represented in the sanctuary with Indian features, dressed in the typical sari and with a crown on her head. The history of the sanctuary itself represents a moment of encounter between Christianity and Indian culture. This is also evident in the history of the apparitions linked to this place. Our Lady appeared for the first time in the 16th century to a boy from Velankanni, a village with about 5,000 inhabitants today, who was carrying milk from his village to Nagapattinam. While he was resting by a pond, the Virgin Mary appeared to him and asked him for milk for her child. The boy gave it willingly and the woman thanked him with a smile. When he reached his customer, the boy told the vision and, as if by a miracle, the container filled with the missing milk, which even overflowed. Amazed, the man wanted to go near the pond and he too had a vision. The locals called the place "Matha Kalum" or "Pond of the Mother of God".
Towards the end of the same century, a second apparition occurred. Mary again appeared to a small boy, sick from birth, who was selling butter under a tree in a place called Nadu Thittu ("Central Mountain"). The Virgin asked for butter for her child and instructed the young Hindu to go to a wealthy Christian in Nagapattinam to build a chapel there. Only when he arrived in Nagapattinam did the boy realize that he had been healed. The wealthy Christian, about whom the woman with the child in her arms told him, also had a vision in the meantime, in which the same woman asked him to build a chapel. As a result, a first small church, or rather a hut, was built in Nadu Thittu, and from then on the place became a place of Marian pilgrimage.
In the 17th century, a Portuguese ship traveling from Macao to Ceylon got caught in a storm. The merchants made a vow to the Mother of God that they would build a shrine at the place where they would land. On September 8th - the feast of the Nativity of Mary - they arrived safely in Velankanni. The hut was replaced by a stone building, which was later enriched by the merchants' votive offerings. Between 1920 and 1933, the shrine was further expanded. On November 3rd, 1962, John XXIII gave it the title of basilica.
Today, the shrine, built 2,400 kilometers southeast of New Delhi, is visited by around 20 million pilgrims from all over the world every year. Masses are celebrated in various languages in the high vaults of the church. As the name of the place suggests, the pilgrims are looked after here. In addition to the church, there is also a home for the disabled, the "Nirmal Hriday Home," which is run by Mother Teresa's sisters. There are also several educational and school centers. In 2004, the city was badly hit by the tsunami, which claimed several hundred lives. Twenty years after this tragedy, everything has now been restored: the Velankanni sanctuary continues to be a place of arrival for millions of pilgrims, a place of peace and prayer, also appreciated by Pope Francis, who is always close to the popular spirituality of the pilgrim faithful, because in them "the beauty of the Church on her journey is reflected, which seeks Jesus in the arms of Mary and leaves her worries and hopes in the heart of the Mother". (F.B) (Agenzia Fides, 6/8/2024)

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