The Church of Our Lady of Liesse was built in 1740 on the site of a 17th-century church. The first stone of the Church of Our Lady of Liesse was laid down on 21 November 1620, in a ceremony attended by Grand Master Alof de Wignacourt and many other members of the Order of St. John. The church was built with funds donated by Fra Giacomo De Chess du Bellay, who was the Bailiff of Armenia.
The church was completely rebuilt by the Langue of France in 1740, and was blessed by Bartolomé Rull. The church was consecrated by Bishop Vincenzo Labini on 23 November 1806. The church was hit by German aerial bombardment in 1942 during World War II, but it was repaired and reopened on 21 February 1952. It was given to the Apostleship of the Sea on 15 September 1961.
The church is built in the Baroque style. It has a dome and a belfry which was designed by Francesco Zammit. It has three altars.
The titular painting of the church depicts a legend about three knights and Our Lady of Liesse, and it was painted by Enrico Arnaux. The relics of the martyr St. Generoso are stored in the church, and they were transferred there from the chapel of Fort Manoel. A statue of the Virgin Mary which had originally been located at Fort Saint Elmo is now found in a niche in the church.
References:The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.