The "Other" Sorrowful Mother Shrine

Have you ever driven out by Bellevue and seen signs for the Sorrowful Mother Shrine? I'd seen those signs for years, and finally stopped there a few years ago to check it out. 

Well, when I saw the above article in the August 1, 1962 Journal about the Sorrowful Mother Shrine, I thought, "Wow, it sure has changed since then." It turns out that this is a different Sorrowful Mother Shrine, one that is located in Norwalk. But it has a rich history, one that is related to a famous automobile industry.

Even the website of the Norwalk Sorrowful Mother Shrine acknowledges that there might be confusion with two same-named Shrines. The website notes, "The Shrine of the Sorrowful Mother is located at 274 West Main Street, in Norwalk. It is often called "the other Sorrowful Mother Shrine" because it is sometimes confused with the more famous Sorrowful Mother Shrine in Bellevue, Ohio.

"Margaret (Theisen) Fisher, wife of Lawrence Fisher, made a generous gift to St. Paul Catholic Church to build a shrine in memory of her parents. The Shrine of the Sorrowful Mother was built in 1928 and still stands on the original site of St. Peter's Church, the first Catholic church in Norwalk. St. Peter's Cemetery is at the rear of the shrine.

"Lawrence and Margaret Fisher were the parents of eleven children, seven sons and four daughters. The sons were notable for starting Fisher Body, an automobile body company, in Detroit in the early 1900s, which was very successful. The families moved from Norwalk to Detroit and became quite wealthy. However, they never forgot their Norwalk roots and, over the years, were generous to both St. Paul Catholic Church and the city of Norwalk."

Today, the Shrine of the Sorrowful Mother in Norwalk is available for small Catholic weddings.