Our Lady of Perpetual Help - Present Caretaker

Present Caretaker

The Superior General of the Redemptorists, Father Nicholas Mauron, brought the urgent matter to the attention of Pope Pius IX, who later decided the icon should certainly be exposed to public veneration and given an official Marian title. The current site chosen by Pope Pius IX was the Church of St. Alphonse, standing as it did on the site where it had formerly been venerated. In 1866, Pope Pius IX wrote a short memorandum ordering the Augustinian friars to surrender the icon to the Redemptorist priests, on condition that the Redemptorists must supply the Augustinians with another picture of Our Lady of Perpetual Help or a good copy of the icon in exchange as a gesture of goodwill. Upon its official transfer, Pope Pius IX finally gave his Apostolic Blessing and titled the icon Mater de Perpetuo Succursu (Mother of Perpetual Help). On June 23, 1867, the image was canonically crowned by the Dean of the Vatican Chapter in a solemn and official recognition of the Marian icon under that title. On April 21, 1866, the Redemptorist Superior General gave one of the first copies of the icon to Pope Pius XI. This copy is preserved in the chapel of the Redemptorists' Generalate in Rome. The original icon remains under the care of the Redemptorist Fathers at the Church of St. Alphonsus with the latest restoration of the icon having taken place in 1990.

Pope Pius IX very words of instructions to the Redemptorists were:

11 December 1865

The Cardinal Prefect of Propaganda will call the Superior of the community of Sancta Maria in Posterula and will tell him that it is Our desire that the image of Most Holy Mary, referred to in this petition, be again placed between Saint John and St. Mary Major; the Redemptorists shall replace it with another adequate picture.

Pope Pius IX