Mother of the Church
The title, Mother of the Church, which is not a dogma in the narrow sense, was a theme of the writings of Augustine of Hippo. It was proclaimed by Pope Paul VI at the Second Vatican Council in 1964. The title, Mother of the Church is a parallel to a more ancient title, Mary, Mother of all Christians which is based on a traditional Catholic interpretation of John 19:25-27:

Jesus' mother stood near his cross... Jesus saw his mother. He also saw the follower that he loved very much standing there. He said to his mother, "Dear woman, here is your son." Then Jesus said to the follower, "Here is your mother."
The traditional Catholic interpretation is that the "beloved disciple" is a type for all Christians who are beloved disciples. Thus, Jesus gives all Christians his mother as their own. As Mother of all Christians, Mary is Mother of the Church. An alternative interpretation is that Jesus was referring only to the Apostle John, asking John to fulfill a son's duty.

In his encyclical Redemptoris Mater, on March 25, 1987, Pope John Paul II said:

Mary embraces each and every one in the Church, and embraces each and every one through the Church. In this sense Mary, Mother of the Church, is also the Church's model.
The title Mother of the Church was again affirmed by him at a general audience on September 17, 1997.

In the culture and practice the Roman Catholic Church - a shrine to the Virgin Mary or Marian shrine is a shrine marking an apparition or other miracle ascribed to the Blessed Virgin Mary, or a site on which is centered a historically strong Marian devotion.

Some of the largest shrines are due to reported Marian apparitions to young and simple people on remote hilltops that had hardly been heard of prior to the reported apparition. The case of Saint Juan Diego's reported vision of Our Lady of Guadalupe in 1531 is similar to the case of Saint Bernadette Soubirous's vision in 1858 of Our Lady of Lourdes. Both saints reported a miraculous Lady on a hilltop who asked them to request that the local priests build a chapel at the site of the vision. Both visions included a reference to roses and led to large churches being built at the sites. Like Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico, Our Lady of Lourdes is a major Catholic symbol in France. Both young people were eventually declared as saints.