Julien Gouyet

Julien Gouyet was a French priest, credited with discovering the House of the Virgin Mary. In 1881, led by the visions of Jesus of the Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich (Klemens Brentano, 1852) he discovered a house near Ephesus in Turkey, said to be the House of the Virgin Mary. Pope Leo XIII visited in 1896, and in 1951 Pope Pius XII declared it a Holy Place. Pope John XXIII made the declaration permanent, and popes Paul VI (1967), John Paul II (1979) and Benedict XVI (2006) all visited the shrine.