Bruges, Belgium
Listen to your life . . . Touch, taste, smell your way to the holy and hidden heart of it because in the last analysis all moments are sacred moments and life itself is grace.
—Frederick Beuchner (1926–), American writer and theologian
The art inside the Church of Our Lady in Bruges speaks to the soul. While Michelangelo’s Madonna and Child beckons worshippers to remember the humanity of his subjects, the painting of the crucified Christ by van Dyck evokes the suffering of Jesus, and the tombs of Charles the Bold and his daughter who died at age twenty-five demonstrate that life can end in an instant and induce contemplation of life’s moments as sacred.
If you want to discover your spiritual core or to see sacred art, visit this site. The church is located at Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekerkhof Zuid. Take the train from Brussels to Bruges (sixty minutes). The E40 connects Calais and Ostend to Bruges, as does the train. Various shuttle-bus services run to Bruges from Charleroi airport.
Use your senses to see the potential for transformation or deepening faith in your life. Make this your prayer: “Holy One: Teach me to listen to my life. Bless my vision that I may see all moments of my life as sacred. Let me live in gratitude and appreciation for this blessed gift of grace.”
Michelangelo created the Madonna and Child for the Cathedral of Siena, but when the cathedral couldn’t pay for it, Bruges merchants Jan and Alexander Moscroen purchased it in 1506.