Beata Vergine Addolorata, Campocavallo, Osimo, Ancona, Marche, Italy
In the 1870s, a small country chapel was built three miles from Osimo, a town just inland from the Adriatic near the world-famous shrine of Loreto. Don Giovanni Sorbellini, appointed in 1883 to say holy day masses at the Campocavallo chapel, hung in it an oleograph of the Pietà he had bought from a traveling salesman. On June 16, 1892, a few women who stayed to pray after mass saw the eyes of the Sorrowful Virgin move and blink. News of the "prodigy" traveled rapidly and widely. On July 7, a blind woman regained sight. The same year, Don Sorbellini began building the present magnificent sanctuary, consecrated in 1905. It's the focus of the Festa del Covo, a Nativity-themed harvest festival the first Sunday of August, and the Festa dell'Addolorata the third Sunday of September. (Information from Osimo's website, www.comune.osimo.an.it; image from Basilica-Santuario di s. Giuseppe da Copertino, www.sgiusecoperosimo.it.)