Maria, Königin des Friedens

Maria, Königin des Friedens (Mary, Queen of Peace) is a pilgrimage church and parish in Neviges, part of Velbert, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. The pilgrimage dates back to 1676. Neviges was the home of a Franciscan monastery from 1675 until the end of 2019. A church dedicated to the Immaculate Conception in 1728 became too small for the growing numbers of pilgrims in the 20th century. Inspired by the Second Vatican Council, Cardinal Josef Frings of Cologne was open to a radically new church building. Gottfried Böhm designed a building in brutalist style that won the cardinal's approval. It was consecrated in 1968, and also became known as the Mariendom and Wallfahrtsdom. It is the second largest church in the Diocese of Cologne, after Cologne Cathedral. It is also the second largest church north of the Alps. The concrete structure with an irregular roof and an interior like a forum became the architect's signature building, and is regarded as one of the important "spatial creations" in 20th-century architecture.

The place of the pilgrimage to Neviges was an apparition of Mary to the Franciscan friar Antonius Schirley in 1676. He performed his daily prayer before a small painting of Mary, when he heard a voice saying "Take me to the Hardenberg, I wish to be worshiped there!" ("Bring mich nach Hardenberg, da will ich verehrt sein!"). Schirley delivered the painting of Mary to a chapel in Hardenberg-Neviges. In 1681, Ferdinand von Fürstenberg, who had been severely ill and was healed, made a pilgrimage of thanks to Neviges. This was the beginning of the pilgrimage. In 1688, the Vicar General of the Diocese of Cologne officially sanctioned the pilgrimage, dedicated to the Immaculate Conception of Mary. It was a decidedly counter-Reformation dedication in a mostly Protestant area. Neviges was home to a Franciscan monastery from 1675, which operated the pilgrimage until the end of 2019. A small new parish church was dedicated to the Immaculate Conception in 1728. It became too small for the growing number, and after World War I, several plans for a new church were made but not carried out. After World War II, 300,000 pilgrims arri

Church data from Wikidata (CC0). Summary from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA).