On February 20, 1743, while lighting a lamp in front of the Holy Image, the sexton of a Maltese church noticed that the face of the Madonna was shinier than usual.
Around the year 1400, the Virgin Mary is said to have appeared to a hunter in a cave. In a short time, the cave became a chapel, and then a church, and then a priory.
The beginnings of the devotion to the Blessed Virgin of Ta’ Pinu are so ancient that they are lost in the midst of time.
These deeply venerated icons were brought to Malta by expatriate Greeks from the island of Rhodes.
The Maltese victory over an Ottoman invading expedition in 1565 providentially happened on the Feast of the Blessed Virgin’s Nativity.
Citizens of Malta painted the crosses on the front of their homes as a show of support and a pledge of service to refugees.
One of the oldest traditions is that St. Luke painted this fresco during his sojourn in Malta, way back in AD 60.
The Santwarju tal-Kunċizzjoni Immakulata tal-Qala is one of the most ancient places of Christian worship in the Maltese Islands.
The second delivery in our Marian Devotion and Veneration in Malta series.
The country is alone among nations for having a 2,000-year-old Christian tradition.
