marian anniversaries     october

October 20

Notre-Dame, Lausanne, Vaud, Switzerland

Pope Gregory X dedicated Lausanne's Cathedral of Our Lady on October 20, 1275.[1] Not only local believers but pilgrims from Germany, France, and Italy worshiped in the magnificent Gothic building. Many brought thanks to Notre Dame de Lausanne for miracles of healing and, especially, liberation from imprisonment.[2] The dedication anniversary was celebrated annually until 1536, when Protestant forces from a supposed ally, Bern, took over the city, and an edict of October 19 suppressed all Catholic services.[3] The Cathedral became a Reformed church, and cartloads of its treasures were taken to Bern, where in 1537 its silver altarpiece and gilded silver statue of the Virgin and Child were melted down for coinage.[4] The Reformed Church's Cathedral of Notre Dame remains a major tourist attraction. A new church of  Notre-Dame in neoclassical style was consecrated in 1835 in the Valentin district, the first Catholic church in the city since the Reformation. On October 13, 1946, a wood polychrome Madonna (right) was installed there. Dated to the 1400s, it was hidden in a barn during the Bernese occupation and kept by nuns of Valentin's Catholic school since 1848.[5] The statue is a focus of prayer for passersby, office workers who come for the noon weekday mass, and other worshipers, who in all light some 300 votive candles a day, according to the pastor. In 1992, Pope John Paul II gave the Valentin Church of Notre-Dame the title of Basilica Minor.[6]

References

Also commemorated this date: