In 1061, during the reign of Saint Edward the Confessor, Richeldis de Faverches, the lady of the manor of Walsingham Parva, saw a vision of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Our Blessed Lady took her in spirit to Nazareth and told her to build a replica of the Holy House in Walsingham as a memorial to the Annunciation and, thus, the Incarnation, so that “all who beseech her help shall find succour there”.
Richeldis was obviously given the dimensions of the Holy House by Our Lady. Richeldis was confused about the location of the house, and she prayed to Our Lady for guidance. The next morning, she found two areas of dry ground, the exact dimensions of the Holy House. She chose the one closest to two wells and work commenced. Try as they might, the workmen could not get the wooden walls of the little Holy House to fit. Again, Richeldis prayed for guidance. The next morning, she awoke to find the house miraculously moved to the second site, some two hundred feet away, and much more soundly built than any of the local workmen could have managed!
It was believed that Our Lady, assisted by angels, had moved the House to a site of her choosing, by which a spring of water, with healing properties, was found. In a vision, Our Lady promised Richeldis, “All who are in any way distressed or in need, let them seek me in that little house you have made at Walsingham. To all that seek me there, shall be given succour”.
Pilgrims to the shrine found that God and heavenly things seemed real to them there. They found that they prayed better there and that their prayers were answered. They believed, too, that wonderful healings and blessings came to them when, with faith, they used the waters of the holy well.
It became the most frequented shrine in England and drew pilgrims from all over Europe. It was popularly spoken of as 'England's Nazareth' and was looked upon as a little piece of the Holy Land in England. Walsingham was a place of prayer, grace, healing, miraculous cures, penance, reparation and reconciliation. It ranked among the four major places of pilgrimage in the Middle Ages, alongside Jerusalem, Rome and Santiago de Compostella, and was the only one dedicated to the Mother of God.
Several English kings were devotees of the Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham. Henry III’s son, Edward I, credited Our Lady with saving his life as a youth. Henry VII was a patron and credited Our Lady with his victory in the Battle of Stoke in 1487. Henry VIII made a pilgrimage to the shrine in 1511 to give thanks for the birth of a son, Prince Henry.
Sadly, in 1538, as part of Henry VIII's dissolution of the monasteries, the great Augustinian priory which, for four centuries since 1153, had housed the Holy House and the Image of Our Lady of Walsingham, was desecrated and destroyed. The famous statue of Our Lady was, it is rumoured, removed and taken to Chelsea and burned. Walsingham was left in desolation and fell into dereliction and anonymity for the next 400 years.
An Anglican convert, Charlotte Pearson Boyd purchased the old Slipper Chapel, roughly a mile away from the former shrine. In 1934 it became the National Shrine of Our Lady in England, and Mass was once more offered in Walsingham. In 1921 Fr. Alfred Hope Patten was appointed Vicar of Saint Mary's, the Anglican parish church of Little Walsingham. In 1922 he placed a replica statue of Our Lady of Walsingham in the church.
Walsingham is the official Shrine of Our lady in England, marking that country as the “Dowry of Our Lady”, a title given her in early medieval times recalling Richard Pynson’s fifteenth century 'Ballad of Walsingham'.
Other Saints of the Day
1. Saint Abadirus of Antinoe
2. Saint Anton Martin Slomsek
3. Saint Gerard Sagredo
4. Saint Lupus of Lyons
5. Saint Terence of Persaro