The Notre-Dame-de-Liesse basilica (Aisne) is the winner of the 2024 “I love my bell tower” competition

The Notre-Dame-de-Liesse basilica (Aisne) is the winner of the 2024 “I love my bell tower” competition

An exemplary mobilization

Francine Normand cannot talk about Notre-Dame-de-Liesse without feeling overcome with emotion. And not only because the basilica hosted the great moments of her life. Located on the coronation route of the kings of France, it houses a black Virgin. “I feel something very strong here,” confides the competition winner, a subscriber to Pilgrim for fifty years. On many occasions, I have prayed to the Black Virgin, and I think she has answered my prayers.” Her fervor is widely shared in this dynamic parish, which is also a place of pilgrimage. So, Francine picked up her pen. It was so important to her to make this bell tower known. “At first, I wasn’t at all convinced that we would win. But I felt a very strong enthusiasm around me: at each mass, we relayed the existence of this competition. This prize makes us happy.” She hopes that it will inspire vocations for pilgrimages to Notre-Dame-de-Liesse…

“At Notre-Dame-de-Liesse, in the Aisne”, a text by Francine Normand

Proudly, you raise your spire full of hope towards the sky. The famous basilica that you overlook is dear to my heart. How many family events, including my wedding, my parents’ funeral, have taken place there!

Built in 1134 by the Knights of Eppes, this holy temple welcomed the kings of France who were going to be crowned in Reims, Joan of Arc and, today, more than eighty thousand pilgrims each year. Upon entering your sanctuary, one notices the very many ex-votos that thank the Black Virgin for having answered their prayers. The first miracle was that of the hanged man, but there have been many others, linked to illness, children, fertility. This subject particularly touches me, because I prayed a lot to Our Lady of Liesse for three desperate young women: today, all three are mothers of charming toddlers. Our grandchildren love to reread your story which began in Egypt, at the time of the Crusades, with the Sudanese princess Ismérie, daughter of the Sultan of Cairo, and the three knights from our region: the imprisonment of the three brothers and their unexpected return, their tenacity, the ebony statue representing the Virgin, which appeared miraculously, then the conversion of Ismérie and her marriage to Robert d’Eppes, son of William II of France.

Our Lady of Liesse… “She gives and will always give joy and gladness to the heart,” I am convinced.

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