The Wieskirche
Pilgrimage church of the Scourged Saviour
People from all over the world come to the Wies. Many search for sense in their life and orientation. This church has the power, by its artistic expression and spiritual message, to give them an answer. Bringing into play all of a person's senses, it allows mind and soul to experience the "Good News of the Wies".
Its architect, Dominikus Zimmermann, almost 70, could not bear to leave this church, his most beautiful and complete work. Thus, he built himself a house almost at its door, where he lived until his death. In thankfulness for the happy completion of the church, he painted a votive tablet showing the pious master architect kneeling before the Scourged Saviour. He signed it: "D.Z. Ex voto A. 1757".
Every pilgrim and visitor to the Wies Church is rewarded by the magnificence and harmony of the wonderful song Zimmermann called forth in building the Wies Church. When the visitor, in encountering the resounding four-tone chord of art, theology, light and music, experiences the total beauty of the Wies, he can experience what the builder of the church, Abbot Marianus II Mayer, expressed:
"Hoc loco habitat fortuna, hic quiescit
cor."
(In this place abideth
happiness, here the heart findeth peace)
We wish with all our hearts that many who
visit our "beautiful Wies" may experience this happiness and find inner
peace.
