The Sanctuary of S. Maria di Panisacco is located upstream of the town of Maglio di Sopra, in the Municipality of Valdagno, and from the high cliff on which it rises, 469 m above sea level, it dominates the entire Agno Valley.
Maybe because of its position, as well as for the architectural harmony and obviously for the religious meaning, it has become patrimony of all the inhabitants of the valley who have made it a destination of continuous pilgrimages. In order to reach it, it is necessary to climb a staircase of 235 steps at the top of which, solitary and cosy, there is a green open space, shaded by some cypresses, which ends with the wide arcade of access to the Sanctuary. A portico with a gabled roof, supported by a double series of three round arches. The Church that follows consists of a simple nave with a wooden truss ceiling, beyond which opens a modest presbytery with an altar dedicated to the Nativity of Mary. On the left side of the nave opens an apse with an altar dedicated to the Sacred Heart.
From the end of the nave you can access, in addition to the sacristies, the tower of the bell tower, whose belfry, open on four sides with as many arched holes, is covered by a four-pitch roof.
It is dedicated to Maria Bambina. Inside is, in fact, a beautiful image of the Virgin in the arms of St. Anne an intense painting that bears the date 1483 and lap art older dates back to 1212 (inside a castle built, or perhaps only rebuilt, in the same period by Panensacco Trissino, son of Olderico d’Alemana, who, descended in Italy with Frederick Barbarossa in the second half of the twelfth century, received from him as a gift the lands of the entire Agno Valley). The site became a place of meditation thanks also to the presence of a monasterium, probably integrated with the houses that today form the small rural aggregate that preserves the name of “Frati di Santa Maria”, from which the only access path to the Church departed.
From 1445 the sanctuary was entrusted to the Canonici Lateranensi who restored the church in 1762 and served until 1771.
Since 1942 the church has been entrusted to the parish of Maglio di Sopra. And it was in the 20th century that the devotion of the people of Valdagno towards the sanctuary of Santa Maria di Panisacco was revived. The parishes began to organize pilgrimages and annual celebrations and collaborated with great generosity to carry out various works of embellishment and restoration.
In 1926 the construction of the staircase was started, which with 240 steps facilitates the path to the rocky spur on which the church stands.
The sanctuary was a point of reference for Christian communities who invoked the protection of the Queen of Peace and pilgrimages were numerous.
At the end of the war, initiatives were multiplied to make it a center of Marian devotion in the Agno Valley.
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