Madhu Church

Why Visit

One of Sri Lanka's most important pilgrimage sites, notable for the way it draws worshippers across religious lines.

The Shrine of Our Lady of Madhu, a Catholic pilgrimage site set deep in the northern jungle, visited by both Christian and non-Christian pilgrims for generations.

History

The Shrine of Our Lady of Madhu traces its origins to the 17th century, when Catholic communities from coastal areas — where Dutch colonial authorities restricted Catholic worship in favour of the Dutch Reformed Church — moved inland and established the shrine as a place they could practice their faith more freely. The statue of Our Lady of Madhu enshrined there is said to have been brought from a coastal church during this period of persecution, carried inland for safekeeping. Over the following centuries the shrine grew into one of Sri Lanka's most important pilgrimage sites, drawing Catholic, Buddhist, Hindu and Muslim visitors alike, an interfaith character that is unusually strong even by Sri Lankan standards. During the civil war, the shrine's remote jungle setting made it a place of refuge for tens of thousands of civilians on more than one occasion, even as fighting at times reached close to the area itself, and it has remained a site closely associated with prayers for peace since.