The St. Mary’s Church in Rõuge was originally built in 1550, but it was damaged badly in the Great Northern War. The present church was reconstructed in 1730’s. In 1854 the church obtained its organ and the altar picture of 'Christ on the cross' by R. von Mühlen.
In 1860 the building was completely renovated, with the walls being made higher and a mirrored arch installed. The Kriisa brothers donated a 31-register organ they had built to the church in 1930. The first Estonian pastor in Rõuge was Rudolf Gottfried Kallas.
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.