This Black Madonna surrounded by White saints was painted in the 15th century in the most difficult to access sanctuary in the world, a 5th century rock hewn church. Pilgrims have to climb 8,460 feet barefoot up a 90 degree cliff to pray here. Women do it in long skirts with babies on their backs! It seems the artist meant to show either that Mary was a Black woman or that her being the Black divine Mother of her Ethiopian children was more important than the historical reality that she came from the same area as many of the White men in the frescos.

Madame l’Afrique is a copy of a French statue crafted in silver by the artist Edmé Bouchardon (1698-1762), which was destroyed during the Revolution…

When fans of the Black Madonna fall into a reverse kind of racism by appreciating only Black Madonnas while disparaging white ones, they would do well to remember Our Lady of Kibeho…

In 1887, Bishop Mathurin Picarda visited the mission of the Holy Ghost Fathers in Guéréo, Senegal, for the baptism of its first Catholic converts…

This is not one of those traditional, ancient European Black Madonnas with miraculous powers that begs the question…