Our Lady of La Leche

The devotion to Nuestra Señora de La Leche y Buen Parto, Our Lady of the Milk and Happy Delivery, comes from Spain, where an image of Mary tenderly nursing the infant Jesus was venerated in Madrid. Spanish settlers brought this devotion to the New World.

In St. Augustine, Florida, founded in 1565, the Mission of Nombre de Dios marks the place where Pedro Menéndez de Avilés landed and where the first parish Mass in what is now the United States was celebrated on September 8, 1565. In the 1600s the Spanish dedicated a shrine there to Our Lady of La Leche, the first Marian shrine in the United States. The chapel was destroyed several times by war and storms; the present ivy-covered chapel was built in 1915, and a copy of the Spanish image stands over its altar.

Couples hoping for a child, expectant mothers and nursing mothers come to the Shrine of Our Lady of La Leche in St. Augustine from all over the world, and many leave letters of thanks for babies born after their prayers.

The shrine holds Masses and blessings for mothers, and families often bring newborns to present them to Our Lady.