The Sanctuary of the Blessed Virgin of Sulo is a Catholic church in the hamlet of Filetto, near Ravenna, a destination for pilgrimages linked to a Marian image held to be miraculous; although located within Ravenna's territory, it belongs to the Diocese of Forlì-Bertinoro.
What to see
Originally there were two separate places of worship in the area, one dedicated to Saint Lawrence and the other, at a spot called Sulo, to the Virgin Mary; in 1561 the Bishop of Forlì united them into a single vicariate based at San Lorenzo, letting the Marian church fall into neglect. From 1618 onward, devotion spread in the area to a sacred image of the Madonna believed to be miraculous, kept by the Gambi family in a small shrine; the growth of the cult, with healings held to be miraculous, led to the restoration of the church of Sulo to house the image, a restoration the Jesuits only completed in 1694, following a 1664 pastoral visit that had ordered it made safe and a period around 1690 when the building risked collapse.
Damaged during the Second World War in 1944, the sanctuary was rebuilt in its present form in 1950; the nearby church of San Lorenzo, by contrast, ceased to be used for worship in 1956 and gradually fell into ruin, today remaining only a wreck. The sacred image, a 17th-century ceramic tile made in Faenza, depicts the Madonna with the Child clinging to her neck; the church walls hold 20th-century pictorial cycles with episodes from the life of Mary, while on the entrance wall two 17th-century paintings recovered from the now-vanished church of San Lorenzo are displayed.
Visiting
The sanctuary is open for worship according to service times; the feast of the Blessed Virgin of Sulo is now celebrated on 15 August, the feast of the Assumption.
Our editors' tip
Look for the two 17th-century paintings recovered from the church of San Lorenzo, now reduced to a ruin: they are among the few surviving traces of a twin place of worship that history has treated very differently from the one dedicated to the Virgin.
