Diocese of Foggia–Bovino celebrates feast of Our Lady of Sorrows on September 21

The Diocese of Foggia–Bovino celebrated the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows on September 21 in San Marco in Lamis. The religious life of the town has centered on devotion to the Virgin Mary since the late 1500s and early 1600s.

According to the Diocese of Foggia–Bovino, priest Costantino Iannacone played a central role in the local cult. Records in the Diocesan Archive of Foggia state that Iannacone witnessed movements of the statue of Our Lady of Sorrows and received a message from the Virgin to prepare for death by sharing in the sufferings of Christ. Following these experiences, Iannacone built a church dedicated to the Seven Sorrows of the Virgin Mary near the old quarantine station of Saints Vito and Rocco. The church was canonically established in 1717 and completed with a bell tower in 1718.

Lay groups dedicated to the devotion merged in 1749 to form the Confraternity of the Seven Sorrows, which was affiliated with the Servi di Maria. The group became an archconfraternity formally affiliated with the Order in 1834, receiving royal assent in 1841.