Bom Jesus do Monte
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How it came to be
Bom Jesus do Monte stands on the slopes of Mount Espinho above Braga in northern Portugal. A chapel on the hill is first recorded in 1373. The Confraternity of Bom Jesus was founded in 1629 and has looked after the sanctuary for almost four hundred years.
Work on the present sanctuary began in 1722 under the Archbishop of Braga, Rodrigo de Moura Telles. Chapels with sculptures of the Passion line a Way of the Cross, and the zigzag Stairway of the Five Senses has a fountain for each sense. The whole recreates a sacred mount of the kind promoted by the Council of Trent, with the church on the summit standing for Jerusalem.
A new church designed by the architect Carlos Amarante was begun in 1784. In 1882 a water-balance funicular was opened between the town and the hill, the first in the Iberian Peninsula and still in use. The sanctuary was inscribed in 2019.
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