The Sheshan Basilica, officially the National Shrine and Minor Basilica of Our Lady of Sheshan () and also known as Basilica of Mary, Help of Christians is a prominent

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy * Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD * Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a let ...

church in

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flowin ...

. Its common name comes from its location on the western peak of

Sheshan Hill Sheshan, formerly known as Zose, is a pair of hills in Songjiang District in western Shanghai, China. The two hills are distinguished as East and , although the more important western hill is also called Sheshan on its own. East Sheshan has an e ...

, located in

Songjiang District Songjiang is a suburban district (formerly a county) of Shanghai. It has a land area of and a population of 1,582,398 (2010). Owing to a long history, Songjiang is known as the cultural root of Shanghai. Songjiang Town, the urban center of the ...

, to the west of Shanghai's metropolitan area. Pope Pius XII raised the Sheshan church to the rank of minor basilica via his pontifical decree “Compertum Habemus” on 12 September 1942. The shrine was previously romanized as Zosè Basilica (pronounced "''Zoh-seh''"), using the Shanghainese pronunciation of "" (Sheshan). A venerated statue of the

Blessed Virgin Mary Mary; arc, ܡܪܝܡ, translit=Mariam; ar, مريم, translit=Maryam; grc, Μαρία, translit=María; la, Maria; cop, Ⲙⲁⲣⲓⲁ, translit=Maria was a first-century Jews, Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Saint Joseph, Jose ...

under the title of

Mary Help of Christians Mary, the Help of Christians ( la, Sancta Maria Auxilium Christianorum) is a Roman Catholic title of the Blessed Virgin Mary, based on a devotion now associated with a feast day of the General Roman Calendar on May 24. John Chrysostom was the ...

is enshrined within as the patroness of the basilica, along with the recently reconstructed icon of

Our Mother of Sheshan Our Mother of Sheshan or Our Lady of Sheshan (佘山聖母), also known as Our Mother (or Lady) of Zo-sè (''Zo-sè'' being the original from the Shanghainese pronunciation of Sheshan), is a celebrated Marian title of the Blessed Virgin Mary venera ...

, both venerated by

Chinese Catholic The Catholic Church in China (called Tiānzhǔ Jiào, 天主敎, literally "Religion of the Lord of Heaven" after the Chinese term for the Christian God) has a long and complicated history. John of Montecorvino was the first Roman Catholic ...

History

The first church on Sheshan hill was built in 1863. During the Taiping Rebellion, Jesuit missionaries bought a plot of land on the southern slopes of the hill. A derelict

Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

monastery had stood on the site. The remaining buildings were demolished, and a small building was constructed as living quarters for missionaries, and a small chapel. At the peak of the hill (where the Maitreya hall had stood), a small pavilion was built in which was placed a statue of the Madonna. In June 1870, unrest in

Tianjin Tianjin (; ; Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Tientsin (), is a municipality and a coastal metropolis in Northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the nine national central cities in Mainland China, with a total popu ...

led to the burning of churches there. The Shanghai Jesuits prayed at the statue of the Madonna and pledged to build a church to her honor in return for her protection. Subsequently, construction of a church designed by the French Jesuit brother Léon Mariot (馬历耀 Ma Liyao, 1830–1902) began in 1871. Wood was shipped in from

, and stone bought from

Fujian Fujian (; alternately romanized as Fukien or Hokkien) is a province on the southeastern coast of China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its cap ...

. All material had to be ported to the peak by hand. The church was completed two years later. This first church was in the form of a cross, and incorporated features of both Chinese and Western architecture. A veranda was placed outside the door, with ten columns. Eight stone lions were placed before the church. In 1894, several ancillary buildings were added. These included the mid-level church, a shrine to the Sacred Heart, the Virgin Mary, and St. Joseph. Fourteen Stations of the Cross were constructed along the path to the church. In 1899–1901, the French Jesuits built an astronomical observatory on the top of the hill, which included a telescope bought by father Stanislas Chevalier (蔡尚質 Cai Shangzhi, 1852–1930) in France. Altar of the Zo-sè Basilica

In 1920, the existing church was found to be inadequate, and it lagged far behind other churches in Shanghai in terms of size and ornamentation. The Shanghai Jesuits asked the Belgian missionary-architect father Alphonse De Moerloose (和羹柏 He Gengbo, 1858–1932) to design the plans for a monumental new basilica. After the demolition of the old church in 1923, the new basilica on top of the hill was slowly built from 1924 to 1935, under the daily supervision of the Portuguese Jesuit missionary-architect father François-Xavier Diniz (葉肇昌 Ye Zhaochang, 1869–1943). On June 14, 1924, in the context of the Catholic Synod of Shanghai, archbishop Celso Costantini and twenty-five members of the synod climbed on Sheshan hill and solemnly consecrated China to the Virgin Mary. Pope Pius XII formally raised the Sheshan church to the rank of minor basilica via his pontifical decree “Compertum Habemus” (originally written on 24 July 1942) and was officially signed and notarized on 12 September 1942. Peter Harmsen ('Shanghai 1937 – Stalingrad on the Yangtse') gives an account of the battle around the basilica during the Chinese retreat from Shanghai. During the

Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopolitical movement in the People's Republic of China (PRC) launched by Mao Zedong in 1966, and lasting until his death in 1976. Its stated goa ...

, Sheshan basilica was severely damaged. The stained-glass windows of the church, carvings along the

Via Dolorosa The ''Via Dolorosa'' (Latin, 'Sorrowful Way', often translated 'Way of Suffering'; ar, طريق الآلام; Hebrew: ויה דולורוזה) is a processional route in the Old City of Jerusalem. It represents the path that Jesus would have t ...

, the statue atop the bell tower, and various other works of iconography were destroyed. In the 1950s,

Ignatius Kung Pin-Mei Ignatius Kung Pin-Mei (; 2 August 1901 – 12 March 2000) was the Catholic Bishop of Shanghai, China, from 1950 until his death in 2000. He spent 30 years in Chinese prisons for defying attempts by China's Communist government to control ...

, the

bishop of Shanghai, was arrested and imprisoned for over 30 years, and the Chinese government put the basilica under the control of the

Catholic Patriotic Association The Catholic Patriotic Association (), abbreviated CPA, is a state-sanctioned organization of Catholicism in the People's Republic of China. It was established in 1957 after a group of Chinese Catholics met in Beijing with officials from the Chi ...

and Chinese bishops not recognized by the Vatican and condemned by the papal encyclical ''

Ad Apostolorum principis ''Ad Apostolorum principis'' (29 June 1958) is an encyclical of Pope Pius XII on Communism and the Church in China. It describes systematic persecutions of bishops, priests, religious and faithful and the attempts of the government to esta ...

''. After the end of the Cultural Revolution in 1976, the damage was gradually repaired. The statue was initially replaced with a simple iron cross, and a replacement statue was installed in 2000. On May 24, 2008,

Pope Benedict XVI Pope Benedict XVI ( la, Benedictus XVI; it, Benedetto XVI; german: link=no, Benedikt XVI.; born Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger, , on 16 April 1927) is a retired prelate of the Catholic church who served as the head of the Church and the soverei ...

announced that he had composed a special prayer for '' Our Lady of Sheshan''. File:Stairs She Shan Basilica 20050410.jpg, Sheshan Basilica File:Sheshan.jpg, Close-up of the basilica File:天主教上海教區佘山進教之佑聖母大殿3 National Shrine and Minor Basilica of Our Lady of Zo-Sè.jpg, The tower. The statue of Our Lady on the cupola can be seen

Layout

The church occupies an area of 1 hectare and is about 70 feet (20 m) tall. It is a rectangular Latin cross in shape, and in classical

basilica In Ancient Roman architecture, a basilica is a large public building with multiple functions, typically built alongside the town's Forum (Roman), forum. The basilica was in the Latin West equivalent to a stoa in the Greek East. The building ...

form. Entrances are placed in the north, west, and south. The main door is in the southwest. The nave is 55.81 m long, 24.68 m wide. The ceiling is 16.46 m high, and the church can seat 3000. The altar is placed at the eastern end, and is built of marble with gold trim and in-laid jade. The exterior is mainly granite, and part of the roof is covered in Chinese-style color-glazed tiles. The bell tower stands on the south-east corner. It is 38 m tall. At the top of its bell tower stands a 4.8m bronze

Madonna and Child In art, a Madonna () is a representation of Mary, either alone or with her child Jesus. These images are central icons for both the Catholic and Orthodox churches. The word is (archaic). The Madonna and Child type is very prevalent i ...

statue ("Our Lady of Zosè").

Other features

The 14 Stations of the Cross are situated at the end of each zig-zag path up the steep hill leading to the church. At the mid-level in an open square where there are two shrines, one in devotion to the Sacred Heart and the other to the Virgin Mary. Nearby is the Sheshan Observatory (now Sheshan Station of the

Shanghai Astronomical Observatory Shanghai Astronomical Observatory (SHAO), is an astronomical observatory in Shanghai. It has a long history of astrometry, and also operates the Sheshan radio telescope as part of the Chinese VLBI array and the European VLBI Network (EVN). ...

). It was originally built by the Jesuits.

Pilgrimage

In 1874, Pope Pius IX declared that pilgrims who went to Sheshan in May (traditionally a Marian month) would receive a

plenary indulgence In the teaching of the Catholic Church, an indulgence (, from , 'permit') is "a way to reduce the amount of punishment one has to undergo for sins". The ''Catechism of the Catholic Church'' describes an indulgence as "a remission before God of ...

. As a result, pilgrims from all over China began to congregate at Sheshan in May, a practice that continues to this day. Every May, the church becomes the destination for pilgrims who travel far and wide to make their annual pilgrimage at Sheshan, praying the Way of the Cross, the Rosary and attending Mass at this holy site. Traditionally, many of the Catholics in the area were fishermen, who would make the pilgrimage by boat. This tradition continues among local Catholics, with the result that the creeks around Sheshan are often crowded with boats in May.

References

External links