Marian Art enjoys a significant level of diversity, e.g., with distinct styles of Statues of the Virgin Mary present on different Continents (as depicted in the Galleries in Roman Catholic Marian Art). These depictions are not restricted to European Art, and also appear in South American paintings. The South American tradition of Marian veneration, through Art, dates back to the 16th-Century, with the Virgin of Copacabana gaining fame in 1582.
Marian Movements and Societies. Throughout the centuries, the devotion to, and the veneration of, the Virgin Mary by Roman Catholics has both led to, and been influenced by, a number of Roman Catholic Marian Movements and Societies. These Societies form part of the fabric of Roman Catholic Mariology. As early as the 16th-Century, the Holy See endorsed the Sodality of Our Lady and Pope Gregory XIII issued a Papal Bull, commending it and granting it Indulgences, and establishing it as the Mother Sodality, and other Sodalities were formed, thereafter.
In the Roman Catholic Church, a Shrine is a Church or sacred place which receives many faithful Pilgrims for a specific pious reason. The local Ordinary must approve the Shrine.
Marian Shrines account for major veneration centres and Pilgrimage sites for Roman Catholics. According to Bishop Francesco Giogia, at the end of the 20th-Century, the most visited Catholic Shrine in the world was that of the Virgin of Guadalupe in Mexico City. In third place was Our Lady of Aparecida, in Brazil, with the non-Marian Shrine of San Giovanni Rotondo in second place. The visual effect of Marian Pilgrimages can be dramatic, e.g., on 13 May and 13 October of each year, close to one million Catholic Pilgrims walk the country road that leads to the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Fátima. Around 2 million Pilgrims journey up Tepeyac Hill on 12 December, each year, to visit the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe. While, in 1968, Aparecida had about four million Pilgrims, the number has since reached eight million Pilgrims per year.
Portuguese: Santuário Nacional de Aparecida, localizado em Aparecida, SP - Brasil.
English: National Sanctuary of Aparecida, located in Aparecida, SP - Brazil.
There are other Marian Pilgrimage sites, such as Medjugorje, which is not considered a Shrine by the Holy See, but, yet, receives a large number of Pilgrims every year. The number of Pilgrims, who visit some of the approved Shrines every year, can be significant. e.g., Lourdes, with a population of around 15,000 people, receives about 5,000,000 Pilgrims every year.
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