Our Lady of Willesden

Our Lady of Willesden is a title of the Blessed Virgin Mary venerated by Christians in London, especially by Anglicans, Catholics, and Eastern Orthodox.

It is associated with the historic image (statue) and pilgrimage centre in the community of Willesden, originally a village in Middlesex, England, but now a suburb of London.

Once a country shrine some eight miles from London, Willesden has always possessed a well, from which the community derives its name, which means "spring at the foot of the hill".

[4] At the start of the twentieth century the Reverend James Dixon, Vicar of Willesden, restored the shrine,[2] and placed a gilded image of Mary and Jesus at the location within the parish church where the original had once stood.

[2] The original spring and holy well at St Mary's Church, which had become lost through disuse after the Reformation, were rediscovered in 1998, and returned to use.

In the chapel: "[W]ith the help of the local Convent of Jesus and Mary, devotion was fostered to Our Lady of Willesden and a new statue blessed by Cardinal Vaughan in 1892.

[7] On 15 August 1958, the feast of the Assumption, Saint Josemaría Escrivá consecrated Opus Dei to the Virgin Mary there in the church.