Sant. Madonna della Moretta

Probably those who have read "Sanctuary of Moretta" has created an image of the Black Madonna, as indeed there are many scattered in our country and in the world, and instead any of it, just the reference to the image from which the pylon was copied, image that exists in the country of Moretta, north of Savigliano and Saluzzo, also in the province of Cuneo.
 
The Sanctuary of N.S. the Moretta is located in Piedmont, on the outskirts of Alba, a town about 60 kilometers from Torino, that is the beginning of the highway from the city in the direction of Savona in the bottom of a beautiful tree-lined street.
Built as a mast in 1685 by Giovanni Antonio Marengo at the intersection of the old road to Diano with that for Savona, recopy a pylon of the country of Moretta, hence the name of NS the Moretta. Wanted to protect livestock and land, it was almost immediately placed in a church that became a place of pilgrimage and devotion demonstrated by so many votive.

The chapel, with the adjoining hermitage and was bought in 1901 by the Oblates of St. Joseph, a religious institute founded in Asti in 1878 by St. Joseph Marello, then Bishop of Acqui and died young. The presence of a small community of monks increased the devotion to the Virgin Mary and felt the urgent need to build a new and bigger sanctuary. The project, in a typical Byzantine style unique to the area, is the work of the engineer. Gualandi of Bologna. Started in 1905, the new sanctuary was blessed August 30, 1908 and in 1909 there was inserted the original Pylon.

The main cupola was placed a statue of the Virgin, gilded copper, made offers of about ten thousand children of the Diocese of Alba. For this N.S. the Moretta well as protector of the countryside and the cattle are revered as special protector of children.
In 1935 the bell tower was built, in style with the church that had been erected in 1921 as a parish, a reference point for the whole neighborhood that gradually grew around the shrine.
 
Devoto particularly illustrious Madonna della Moretta was D. Alberione, founder of the Pauline Family, which before the effigy of Our Lady Moretta was the inspiration for the work that would then start.
The numerous votive offerings testify intense popular devotion and special protection of the Virgin invoked only for campaigns, for children and for the military.
The Oblates of St. Joseph continues, in the spirit of their founder their service in the Sanctuary and in the Parish with particular attention to young people, aided in this by the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians who are now in the shadow of the Sanctuary since 1919.
The Sanctuary has the facilities needed that little bit of hospitality day that pilgrims could stop not only a celebration, but that they also need local, which are also those of the Parish, where to have a meal.