Mary Statues

Our Lady of Beauraing - also known as the Virgin of the Golden Heart – is the title of 33 Marian apparitions reported in Beauraing, Belguim between November 1932 and January 1933 by five children.  For several years after the apparitions, pilgrims flocked to the small town of Beauraing, and many cures were claimed.   In 1943, it was authorized as a true apparition.  She is celebrated under this title on November 29.

In 1998, a man from Utah became curious about a statue on the grounds of a church near his home. The research led the Utah man to write a booklet about the story, with photos of some of the statues. 

The man from Utah found out that the donor was George Herter of Waseca.  George had married a Belgian girl during WW2, the couple said if he did not get killed, they would spend a day at the Shrine of the Blessed Virgin at Beauraing, Belgium.  Before he left Europe, they did go to Beauraing, and received pieces of the hawthorn tree near where Our Lady appeared.

They did not travel to USA together (Army would not let them).  But their only child (son) contracted typhus on the boat.  Mrs. Herter was put on the train, but asked to get off in Pittsburg to find a Catholic hospital as she knew her son was dying.  At the hospital she put a sprig of the hawthorn tree underneath his pillow, and he recovered almost at once.  (And this miracle is registered in Beauraing).

George had three statues sent to him by Pro Maria of Beauraing – one for their backyard, one for the Sisters of St. Francis, and one for a  friend recently cured of cancer.  But he and his wife want to donate to fifty or more to whoever wants one, and they will be cast in aluminum to survive any weather, and have a piece of the hawthorn tree.

Some of the other locations – most confirmed with photo, some on a list:
1) Owatonna MN – Bohemian Catholic Church (photo)
2) Salt Lake City (photo)
3) Sacred Heart, Waseca – vandals desecrated and it was removed  (photo of base)
4) St Joseph’s- St John’s School, Mankato MN (photo)
5) St John’s Abbey, Collegeville MN  (photo)
6) Our Lady of Mt Carmel, Easton MN  (photo)
7) St Mary’s Catholic School, Winona MN  (photo)
8) St Bernard’s Catholic Church, Talkeetna, AK  (photo)
9) Mayo Clinic, Rochester MN
10) St Marys Hospital, Rochester MN  (we found mention of it in a bulletin, but the Sisters did not remember this particular statue)