marian anniversaries     july

Sunday after July 2

Notre-Dame-au-Bois, Braine-le-Château, Walloon Brabant, Belgium

In 1697, Pierre Duchesne was saying the rosary as he walked the 20 miles from the town of Enghien to his farm, when about halfway home he saw some children playing with a wooden statue of the Virgin and Child. Seeking to save the image from profanation, he traded for it some toys he was bringing to his own children. Later, he installed the statue in an open box which he hung by the road. After many reports of answered prayers from neighbors and passersby, Duchesne built a small brick chapel to house the image (Auguste Joseph de Reume, Les vierges miraculeuses de la Belgique, Vve H Casterman, Tournai, 1878, digitized by Google, p. 230).

When the roadside chapel to the Mother of Mercy outside Braine-le-Château was rebuilt in 1740, the dedication stone was turned inside out, so pilgrims can no longer see its original inscription: "St. Mary, refuge of those vexed with fever, pray for us." But they still come to pray at the shrine now called Our Lady in the Woods, especially for the protection of livestock. On the Sunday after July 2, a procession leaves the town square of Braine-le-Château after the 10:00 mass to go to the country chapel, where an open-air mass is said. The photo (left) of the small, dark Virgin and Child, in white robes and rococo chair, is from Unité Scoute de Noucelles, www.noucelles.be. 

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