Holy Mary Shrine

In 1974 an insurance salesman witnessed a miracle: The Holy Mary appeared to him in a local Roman Catholic Church. To pay tribute to the event the man, Joffery Cochennic, built this shrine in Golden Meadow, Louisiana.

Inside the shrine is a letter from Cochennic to welcome you, dated 1988. It tells the origin story of the shrine:

In 1974 I was selling insurance and had the habit of stopping in Our Lady of Prompt Succor Church in Golden Meadow, Louisiana where I live, to say some prayers.

One day while I was praying in the first pew close to the Blessed Sacrament, I asked Jesus and Mary that I would so much like to see her. The moment I asked, I felt her present in Church. I raised my head to look where the statues were and they were not there anymore, and she was standing where the statues had been. She was so beautiful that there is no way I can describe her beauty. She looked at me and I looked at her. Her eyes were a beautiful deep blue. She looked like she was about twenty years old. She was about five feet eight inches tall, and that’s what I had her carved out of a red cypress tree. After a while I put my head down and thanked God and her and when I raised my head again, the statues were back in place and she was not there anymore. I went home and told my wife Kate about what happened to me in Church and that I would build a shrine for her. Since then, I’ve built the Holy Mary Shrine in her honor.

Inside the shrine there is seating for praying, improvised local art, and a book of visitors with their own detailed stories.