This church is famous because of a miraculous painting that made it a destination for pilgrims in the past. It is still a place to put ex voto and still people come out of curiosity. For example, in many marriage contracts one condition was that the husband would take the wife to this sanctuary in the first year of marriage. The miraculous painting is now flanked by a statue of the Madonna in a black dress that is embroidered in gold. Painting and statue are in the left nave of the church which was rebuilt in the 19th Century. The original structure now represented only by the bell tower was built in the 17th Century. The center of Castellamare Adriatico were once made up of the piazza, the fountain with a drinking trough, the ex-convent of the Cappuccini and the peasant houses built around the church.
