Notre-Dame de Bonne-Délivrance, la Vierge noire de Neuilly

Neuilly-sur-Seine

Behind a quiet boulevard in Neuilly watches one of the oldest pilgrimage Virgins of Paris. The statue of Notre-Dame de Bonne-Délivrance, a Black Madonna also known as the "Virgin of souls in distress", had been venerated since the Middle Ages in the church of Saint-Étienne-des-Grès, on the Montagne Sainte-Geneviève, where Canon Jean Olivier founded her confraternity. Tradition tells that the young Francis de Sales, a student in Paris gnawed for weeks by the terror of being damned, came to kneel before her around 1587: he recited the Memorare and rose delivered from his despair — the future saint and doctor of gentleness always attributed his peace to this Virgin. The Revolution nearly swept everything away: the church was closed in July 1790, but Madame de Carignan Saint-Maurice bought the statue and hid it. Imprisoned in 1793, she met in her cell the superior of the Sisters of Saint-Thomas-de-Villeneuve and vowed, should they survive, to entrust the Virgin to them: a promise kept on 2 July 1806, in the rue de Sèvres. When the community settled in Neuilly in 1908, a new chapel was raised for the statue, solemnly blessed in 1910. People still come: expectant mothers receive the ribbon of Notre-Dame de Bonne-Délivrance, and the feast of 18 July gathers pilgrims every year around the Black Madonna who came through eight centuries, a revolution and three removals.

Getting there : 52 boulevard d'Argenson, chapel of the Sisters of Saint-Thomas-de-Villeneuve; métro line 1, Pont-de-Neuilly or Les Sablons, then a 10-minute walk; open during the community's reception hours.

Opening times and access details are given as a guide only: check before you set out.

Ambient sound