MERCY TOURS
Your Catholic pilgrimage resource
A Spiritual and Cultural experience
This basilica is one of the oldest and most important shrines in the world dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary. One of Rome’s four major basilicas, it was built because of a request of Our Lady. According to tradition, on August 4th, 352, the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared simultaneously to Pope Liberius and to Giovanni, a Roman patrician. She said a miraculous snowfall would happen and outline where the church was to be built. The next day August 5th, snow indeed did fall on the Esquiline Hill in Rome in the middle of a heat wave. Pope Liberius immediately ordered the basilica to be built. The event provided us with one of Our Lady’s oldest titles, Our Lady of the Snows.
There are two especially noteworthy Christian treasures in this basilica. One is a relic of the manger from Bethlehem in which the baby Jesus was laid in. Facing this magnificent relic is a marble statue of Pope Pius IX, who proclaimed the dogma of the Immaculate Conception in 1854.
The second is the painting of the Blessed Mother known as the Salus Populi Romani, (The Salvation of the Roman People) for the exceptional devotion, which the people of Rome have for this image of the Virgin. Tradition attributes the painting to St. Luke. St. Mary Major contains some the finest artwork and architectural wonders in the world.
