Our Lady in Mechelen

 In 1613, 14 year old Jan Berchmans came to Mechelen to study. Jan (John) Berchmans later became a saint in the Catholic Church. He had previously lived in Diest, just a few miles from Scherpenheuvel, and had visited Scherpenheuvel often. He had a strong devotion to Mary. It was recorded that while in Mechelen he would visit St. Rombout's Cathedral and spend time praying at an altar there that had a replica of Our Lady of Scherpenheuvel. (See "A Bishop's Tale", Harline and Put, Yale University Press, 2001, pages 184 to 188)

Mechelen was the home of Archbishop Hovius of the Archdiocese of Mechelen. The fact that a replica of Our Lady of Scherpenheuvel is found in the cathedral there so early in the 17th century is a testimony to the early importance and fame of Scherpenheuvel.  

Jan Berchmans became a Jesuit. Recall that it was a Jesuit in Luxembourg in 1624 who started processions with Our Lady of Consolation in Luxembourg, and that Albert and Isabella supported the missions of the Jesuits in the Spanish Netherlands. The Jesuits had first arrived in Mechelen in 1611. Archbishop Hovious enlisted the help of the Jesuits to produce a new catechism for children. With 30 houses in the Spanish Netherlands, the Jesuits were very well represented there. They had opened up many free schools in a region where war had closed many schools, leaving the young without a good education. 

Catharina

 Miraculous healings helped to make Scherpenheuvel a popular pilgrimage site. One well documented miracle happened to Catharina Serraerts.

Catharina Serraerts was born into a prominent family. She was also born with a crippled left leg. Her left leg was shorter than the right and her left hip was misaligned, causing her left knee to hit her right thigh. Her family had several doctors attempt to help her, but the best they could do is provide her with a very thick shoe that allowed her left foot to reach the ground. She could walk, but with great difficulty and pain. 

Archbishop Hovious had known Catharina since she was a child. At the age of 16 she became a cloistered nun. The cloister was 20 miles from Scherpenheuvel. The other nuns and their mother superior were witnesses to Catharina's disability. Their confessor who visited the cloister was a witness. The archbishop was a witness. Her family and their doctors witnessed her disability. The doctors had given up hope for a healing. 

Word began to spread about miraculous healings at Scherpenheuvel. One day, when Catharina was 35 years old, a nobleman on a journey to Scherpenheuvel stopped by the cloister where Catharina had spent her entire adult life. He noticed her disability and offered to let her ride to Scherpenheuvel in his carriage. The Mother Superior consented to let Catharina leave the cloister accompanied by another nun. The nobleman spent three days in the nearby town of Diest. The nuns were also provided a room at Diest. Each of the three days they went to Scherpenheuvel to pray before the miraculous statue of Mary. After returning to the cloister, on the way to her room, Catharina felt something happening to her leg. She realized that a healing had begun. That night she fell asleep praying rosaries. In the morning the healing was complete. She could walk normally and did not need the thick shoe.

Those who had witnessed her disability now witnessed her healing. The other nuns at the cloister, the Mother Superior, the doctors, her confessor. She was allowed out of the cloister once more to go see Archbishop Hovious. (The archbishop's own sister had previously gone to Scherpenheuvel and had been cured of a fever.) The nobleman who had taken her to Scherpenheuvel, the Marquis of Havre, returned to see the miracle. This miracle was recorded in P. Numan's history of miracles at Scherpenheuvel, published in 1604 at Leuven. 

History of St. Augustine parish in Leopold Indiana

 Msgr. Jean-Francois Augustin de Bessonies was born in Sousceyrac, France, on June 17, 1815, on the day after the Battle of Waterloo. He became a seminarian of the Diocese of Vincennes in 1836, while still living in France. He was ordained a deacon at Christmas in 1838 and then traveled to Indiana in 1839. Fr. Bessonies was ordained as a priest by Bishop de la Hailandiere in Vincennes on January 18, 1840. The bishop assigned him to ministry in Rome, but Fr. Bessonies was a little disappointed to learn that this was Rome, Perry County! He spoke almost no English and had a hard time getting to Perry County because he didn't understand any directions people gave him, but he finally made it. Fr. Bessonies heard about how German settlers had been enticed to settle in Jasper and Ferdinand in southern Indiana by the priest there placing ads for settlers in the Cincinnati newspapers. So he decided to do the same thing, with Belgian settlers. He founded the town of Leopold (named after King Leopold of Belgium) and then advertised for settlers from Belgium and Luxembourg. The church in Leopold, St. Augustine, was named after Fr. Bessonies. Fr. Bessonies went on to have an illustrious career, forming new parishes all over the diocese. He spent 1853-1854 at St. Augustine Church in Fort Wayne, then went to Jeffersonville, building St. Augustine Church, and also served at St. Mary-of-the-Knobs. In 1857 he arrived in Indianapolis, where he built St. John the Evangelist Church on the current site. He also built the second St. John the Evangelist church building, ten years later. Msgr. Bessonies was very active in Indianapolis. He bought the land for Holy Cross Cemetery and enticed the Sisters of the Good Shepherd and the Little Sisters of the Poor to come to the diocese. He was the vicar geneneral from 1872 to 1877, when he became the administrator of the diocese after the death of Bishop de St. Palais. In 1878 he became the vicar general again until the time of his death in 1901. He traveled all over the diocese blessing cornerstones and new churches in the absence of the bishop. Bessonies was named a Roman Prelate, with the title of "monsignor," by Pope Leo XIII in 1884. Msgr. Bessonies retired as pastor of St. John's in 1892, but continued to live there until his death on February 22, 1901. He is interred in St. John's Church. 

The above is from the Archives of the Archdiocese of Indianapolis. St. Augustine parish in Leopold, Indiana is the also the site of the Shrine of Our Lady of Consolation. 

I noticed that this article says the parish of St. Augustine was named after Fr. Bessonies, whose middle name was Augustin. There is probably a connection. However, the parish is named SAINT Augustine. The good Monsignor Fr. Bessonies is very likely in Heaven and praying for us, but he has not yet been canonized. 

Clothing the Statue

 "Isabella, an expert seamstress, followed the old Spanish custom of sewing clothes for the image." Quote from page 100 of "A Bishop's Tale, Mathias Hovius Among His Flock in Seventeenth-Century Flanders" by Craig Harline and Eddy Put. Published by Yale University Press, 2001. 

Thus, we learn how the custom of dressing statues of Our Lady of Consolation came about. (Chapter 6 of "A Bishop's Tale" is about Our Lady of Scherpenheuvel.)

Isabella was born and raised in Spain. She was well educated and spoke Spanish, Dutch, Italian, and French. In 1599, on her way to the Spanish Netherlands, she and her husband Albert stopped in Nancy at the palace of the Duke of Lorraine. (See page 49 of the above-mentioned book.) Recall that just a few years later, in 1607, an altar piece with an image of Our Lady of Consolation would be installed at the Jesuit novitiate in Nancy. The Archdukes Albert and Isabella were very religious. They were generous in funding the Jesuits in the Spanish Netherlands. Recall it was a Jesuit in Luxembourg who titled a statue of Our Lady "Conolatrix Afflictorum". That statue in Luxembourg also wore a mantel. After Albert died, Isabella eventually retired and returned to Spain. There she became a nun until she died in 1633 at the age of 67. 

Note the Flemish inscription above

and the French inscription below

the statue.

An old picture of Scherpenheuvel

 

This picture is from the three-volume work Chorographia sacra Brabantiae by Antonius Sanderus. It was published in 1626 (another source says 1627) and depicts Our Lady of Scherpenheuvel. This scanned copy is available from Google Books. This image from Scherpenheuvel is a very close match to the images at Luxembourg and Kevelaer. Thus, another connection linking the three and therefore linking Our Lady of Scherpenheuvel with Our Lady of Consolation. 

The current statue at Scherpenheuvel looks slightly different. In that statue Madonna and Child share a mantel and the mantel is not as wide. This image from 1626 was circulated in this three-volume set of Chorographia sacra Brabantiae. This 1626 picture is the earliest I have found. I have recently learned that the original Scherpenheuvel statue was destroyed by Protestants and later replaced when Catholics regained control of the region. 

In the background there is a procession. It can be clearly seen if the picture is enlarged. Recall that Fr. Jacques Broquart made his first procession with Our Lady of Consolation in 1626 in Luxembourg. This is another connection to Our Lady of Luxembourg, which is closely associated with processions. This picture shows the three different chapels that were built at Scherpenheuvel. Of course, they all did not exist at once. The largest on the right is the newest and also the one that exists today. The man in the lower left, Hans Clemens, was cured after visiting.  His legs were folded up in front of him and his knees were attached to his chest. He had been that way since birth. His legs straightened out and he was able to walk after praying at Scherpenheuvel. 

Below is the image of Our Lady of Kevelaer, which came from Luxembourg. Notice the similarities. The processions. The domed building. This image is from 1641. 

Consolatrix Afflictorum

Our Lady of Kevelaer

From Luxembourg

Marian devotion in Belgium

 The Rosary in Belgium

Our Lady of Consolation was not the only Marian devotion in the Low Countries. 

"In 1236, 15 years after the death of St. Dominic, Dominican priests were serving as the directors of a religious community known as the Beguines of Ghent. A religious community of women, the Beguines were required by their rule to pray three sets of 50 Hail Marys on a daily basis. Before each Our Father, the leader was to read aloud a mystery from the life of Jesus so that everyone could meditate on the mystery while praying the Hail Marys. The fact that the Beguines were performing this practice under the direction of the Dominicans has made many historians posit that the religious women were praying all the mysteries of the rosary-Joyful, Sorrowful, and Glorious-every day."  Fr. Donald Calloway, MIC, in his book "Champions of the Rosary", 2016, page 47. Fr. Calloway attributes this information to Pope Leo XIII, Supremi Apostolatus Officio, Encyclial, September 1, 1883, as quoted in "The Rosary of Our Lady: Translations of the Encyclical and Apostolic Letters of Pope Leo XIII", ed. William Raymond Lawler, OP.  

This was in the 13th century. Recall that it was also in the 13th century that the Beguines at Vilvoorde recieved a statue of Our Lady of Consolation. Vilvoorde is only 38 miles from Ghent. Ghent is also only 36 miles from Mechelen, the seat of the diocese when Scherpenheuvel was approved in the 17th century. 

In the 14th century, because of the Black Plague, society was very much disrupted, and the rosary was neglected. 

Blessed Alan de la Roche (Alanus de Rupe) revived the practice of the rosary in the 15th century. He preached the rosary throughout Northern France, Flanders (today the Flemish speaking region of Belgium), and the Netherlands. He taught for a while in Ghent. He was very successful in re-establishing the rosary and also established the Rosary Confraternity. 

"Blessed Alan died at Zunolle in Flanders September 8, 1475, after having brought over one hundred thousand people into the Confraternity." St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, TAB books edition 1987, page 30. Translated by Mary Barbour. (Zunolle is Zwolle, Netherlands.)

Because of the work of Blessed Alan and his fellow Dominicans, devotion to the rosary eventually spread throughout Europe. This revival of the rosary started in the same region where Our Lady of Consolation became popular. I am not connecting the two devotions, merely pointing out that Marian devotion was very popular in this region during these times. 

Recall that St. Philip Neri founded the Oratorians, the order that ministered at Scherpenheuvel and Kevelaer. St. Philip Neri had a devotion to the rosary. "St. Philip Neri walked the streets of Rome with the rosary in his hand; he sought out wayward souls and by means of the rosary inspired them to repent." Quote by Blessed James Alberione, in Champions of the Rosary by Fr. Donald Calloway, page 269.