MONTSERRAT, "the Saw-Toothed Mountain," is one of the holiest places in the shrine-rich Mediterranean world. Rising in sheer purple splendor above the plain 30 miles inland from Barcelona, Spain, the mountain is topped with spires of steeple-like rock. And there, inside the crown, perches an ancient fortress-monastery, where the "Black Virgin" is enshrined. Legend has it that the dark wooden Madonna with the Child upright in her lap appeared as if by miracle within a cave in the mountain one day ten centuries ago. First a church, then a monastery was built near...
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