This year being a special one as the Year of Mercy, we are called to show the merciful face of the Father; we also are given opportunities to obtain indulgences by visiting places of pilgrimage centers. We the sisters of Carmel Convent, Ashaniketan being in the Parish of the Rosario Cathedral of Mangaluru are already visiting one of the pilgrimage centres of the Mangaluru Diocese every day. Yet Divine Providence chose Friday following the Divine Mercy Sunday for us to visit a shrine of our Lady in the neighbouring diocese. It being a public holiday because of Ugadi, our Superior Sister Maria Shubha organized a pilgrimage to Harihar in the diocese of Shimoga.
On 8th April 2016 we got into a vehicle at 4.45 a.m. At 10 a.m. we were at Yesu Kripa convent, Shimoga. There were only three sisters there, yet they entertained all the thirteen of us with much love and two of them accompanied us to our pilgrimage place. On the way we looked around the place full of fields, greening our eyes and minds. We reached Harihar at 1p.m. It was indeed a miracle that a priest had just begun the Eucharist for a group of sisters and their candidates of the FMM congregation. We joined in for the celebration of the Eucharist after which we prayed in front of the miraculous statue of our Lady with much love and reverence. People of other faiths, caste and creed have ‘urulu seve’ from the main gate to the church door which is very touching as well as inspiring. The church has an Adoration Chapel, a grotto of our Lady, a beautiful crib and Stations of the Cross.
We had a sumptuous meal at the presbytery. The parish priest then took us to the museum which depicts the story of our Lady of Harihar with carved paintings. It is said that our Lady appeared in South India in only two places i.e. one at Vailankani and the other at Harihar.
The legend says that a poor Brahmin of Harihar was drowned while performing his morning ablutions/ritual rites in the river Tungabhadra. To his shock, he was caught in a swirl. As he struggled, he cried aloud for help in vain as no one was around to help him. He caught hold of some statue and the next moment he found himself on the bank of the river. He was overjoyed to have this statue of our Lady with folded hands, standing on a crescent moon. Having reached home, he narrated to his wife and children how he was saved from the swirling waters. His children, being unaware that it was the statue of our Lady, considered it as a puppet and started playing with it by tying a string around it. The things that followed did not augur well for the children. This insult brought a kind of allergy/swelling on the children’s body and the Brahmin too lost his eye-sight. That night the Brahmin had a vision of our Lady who told him that she had rescued him from the swirl and that she should be venerated at Harihar. He would be greatly blessed if he honoured the venerable statue. When he got up, he realized that he re-gained his eye-sight and his wife and children were healed. Even his wife who suffered from tuberculosis was healed. He called her as the Lady of Truth and along with the people of his village venerated her by placing her in a niche like hole in a tree. People started visiting the tree with curiosity. Those who came for the darshan of this statue began to call it “satyamma”, meaning to say “mother of truth”.
Meanwhile, a Christian soldier from Chitradurga who got interested wanted to have a darshan of ‘satyamma’. While closely watching the statue, he found that it was none other than the statue of Mary. So he stealthily robbed the statue at night and placed it in a linen cloth. After travelling for about 12kms on his horse near Anagodu, he fell asleep. That same night in a vision our Lady told him that she wanted to be venerated at the place of Harihar. When he got up, he found only the cloth and not the statue. As the tradition has it, the statue was miraculously spotted at the place in the tree where it was earlier. Instantly he knelt down and begged pardon from the Mother.
As per the instructions of the Mother, the soldier rushed to Chitradurga and informed the British Collector. Having listened to the soldier carefully, the British Collector got interested and visited the Brahmin’s place. Having studied the statue closely at the house of the Brahmin, the collector came to the conclusion that it was none other than the statue of Mother Mary. He requested the Brahmin to hand it over to the Christians for veneration. At this point the Brahmin narrated the entire episode of his being rescued from the water etc. In gratitude he offered his own land and the house for the purpose of veneration. Thus the devotion to our Lady increased at Harihar which is now declared as a pilgrimage centre.
There are also some rare things which are preserved in this museum. Then we watched a movie of our Lady of Harihar and this has left a permanent mark in our memory.
With deep gratitude to our Lady we returned from this hallowed place; we also visited the burial place of the Brahmin where he had first worshipped our Lady.
The Year of Mercy truly gave us an opportunity to visit the Harihara Mathe ‘Our Lady of Health’. For the thirteen of us it is a memorable event indeed!
Sister Vinitha Pinto A.C.,
Carmel Convent, Ashaniketan
