History

Devotion to the martyrs had been growing for many years before their beatification in 1925. In 1907, in the parish of Waubaushene, at the site of the martyrdom of the Jesuits Fr. Jean de Brébeuf and Fr. Gabriel Lalemant, a small chapel was consecrated, only 12 km from the present shrine. For 18 years thousands of pilgrims visited that modest sanctuary, finding lodging in a 40-room guest house.

In 1925, on the initiative of Fr. John M. Filion, a farm was purchased on the hill by a sandy road, opposite the ruins of Ste-Marie. Serving at once as architect and construction manager, Fr. Filion, with the help of 50 local sailors and several lumber firms, managed to close the roof before winter. In keeping with the founder's wish the church was kept in a simple country style, its vault shaped like an overturned canoe. With its stone finish, the church on the hill has always cut an impressive figure. The resourceful founder acquired, for a token $3,000 from the demolition of St. Peter's Church in Toronto, no fewer than three altars, communion rails, pews and stained glass. That same year the cathedral in London, having renovated its own sanctuary, donated to Midland its Stations of the Cross and stained-glass windows painted in Germany.

The shrine was consecrated on Saturday, June 25, 1926 by Cardinal O'Connell of Boston, who came to Midland straight from the Eucharistic Congress in Chicago.

Notable among the initiatives of the shrine's directors were the historical pageants about the martyrs staged in 1936-37; the 1949 spectacle "Homage to Canada," which over four evenings drew 40,000 delighted spectators to performances by 25 musicians of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and 500 actors; and the annual Days of Prayer of the local First Nations, begun by Fr. Rye.

In 1984, on the shrine's 70th anniversary, Midland received the visit of Holy Father John Paul II, who proclaimed before the television cameras, to Canada and the world: "This Shrine of the Martyrs is a place of pilgrimage and prayer, a monument to God's blessing in the past, an inspiration for us as we look to the future."

Another landmark came in 1992, when the relics of St. Jean de Brébeuf, his skull, returned from Quebec to the shrine.

Every year pilgrims come to what is, outside Quebec, Canada's only national shrine. They come singly and in organized groups (schools, parishes, dioceses), by car, by bus, even on foot. Their number now reaches 200,000 a year, and the ethnic chapels scattered through the park-garden around the shrine witness countless processions, Masses and prayers in more than 20 languages. Meanwhile, in Fr. Filion's rustic church, four Masses are celebrated in English every day.

On another anniversary of the shrine, let us repeat after Pope John Paul II: "Let us recall for a moment those heroic saints whom we honour in this place, and who left us so magnificent a heritage."