A lame boy would sell buttermilk to passing travellers, who would pause in the shade of a large Banyan tree, to escape the heat of the day.

The woman asked the boy to go to Nagapattinam, and find a certain Catholic man in the town, and tell him to build a chapel at Vailankanni in her honour.

The Catholic men of Nagapattinam subsequently built a thatched chapel at Vailankanni, dedicated to Mary under the title of "Our Lady of Good Health".

In the 17th century, a Portuguese merchant vessel sailing from Macau to Ceylon was caught in a severe storm in the Bay of Bengal.

The sailors prayed fervently for Mary, Star of the Sea to save them, and promised to build a church in her honor wherever they could land.

The Pope's apostolic brief noted that pilgrims in large numbers had been visiting the shrine for a long period of time, and that it was hailed as the "Lourdes of the East".

[11] The feast day prayers are said in Tamil, Marathi, East Indian, Malayalam, Telugu, Kannada, Konkani, Hindi and English.

[19][20] The San Isidro Labrador Parish Church in Bambang, Bulakan, Bulacan was declared Our Lady of Good Health Marian Shrine.