Christianity sacred sites in Spain

Arantzazu Sanctuary

Oñati, Gipuzkoa, Spain

Tucked into a dramatic mountain gorge in the Basque hills above Oñati, Arantzazu is at once Spain's most architecturally radical Catholic basilica and the living heart of...

Ávila Cathedral

Ávila, Ávila, Spain

Ávila Cathedral rises where devotion and defense were never separate acts. Its granite apse, the cimorro, is built directly into the medieval city wall as one of its...

Basílica de Nuestra Señora del Pilar (Zaragoza)

Zaragoza, Zaragoza, Spain

Catholic tradition places the Virgin Mary's first apparition on 2 January AD 40 — while she was still living in Jerusalem — to the apostle James the Greater on the banks...

Basilica of Begoña

Bilbao, Biscay, Spain

On a hill above Bilbao's Old Town, the Basilica of Begoña has been the spiritual home of the Basque people since the medieval era....

Basilica of Saint Teresa, Alba de Tormes

Alba de Tormes, Salamanca, Spain

In the center of Alba de Tormes, two adjoining buildings tell one story split across three centuries....

Basilica of San Isidoro

León, León, Spain

On the edge of León's old town, this Romanesque church holds the relics of Saint Isidore of Seville alongside the tombs of eleven kings and twelve queens of León....

Basilica of San Vicente, Ávila

Ávila, Ávila, Spain

Just outside Ávila's medieval walls, the Basilica of San Vicente rises over the traditional site where three sibling martyrs, Vicente, Sabina, and Cristeta, were killed...

Basilica of Santa Maria del Mar

Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain

A soaring Catalan Gothic basilica in Barcelona's Born district, built between 1329 and 1384 not by nobility but by the sailors, fishermen, and bastaixos dockworkers of the...

Basilica of Santa María, Elche

Elche, Alicante, Spain

The Basilica of Santa María in Elche, southeastern Spain, is the home of the Misteri d'Elx — a fully sung medieval liturgical drama on the Assumption of the Virgin,...

Basilica of the Royal Marian Shrine of Our Lady of Candelaria, Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain

Candelaria, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Spain

On Tenerife's Atlantic coast, the Basilica of Our Lady of Candelaria holds the patroness of the Canary Islands in a sanctuary built above the cave where the Guanche people...

Basilica Shrine of Caravaca de la Cruz, Spain

Caravaca de la Cruz, Murcia, Spain

One of only five Catholic Holy Cities in the world, Caravaca de la Cruz holds a relic believed to contain a fragment of the True Cross....

Burgos Cathedral

Burgos, Burgos, Spain

Burgos Cathedral rises in the heart of Castile, Spain's first Gothic church and the only Spanish cathedral designated as a standalone World Heritage Site....

Cathedral of Lugo

Lugo, Lugo, Spain

Lugo Cathedral has kept the consecrated Host exposed on its altar, day and night, without interruption, for longer than anyone can fully document....

Cathedral of Menorca

Ciutadella de Menorca, Balearic Islands, Spain

The Cathedral of Menorca stands in the old town of Ciutadella, its Catalan Gothic nave begun in 1300 on the site of the city's principal mosque....

Cathedral of Murcia

Murcia, Murcia, Spain

Seat of the Diocese of Cartagena since 1291, the Cathedral of Murcia rises on the foundations of the city's former Great Mosque and holds, beneath its main altar, the...

Cathedral of Santa Maria of Ibiza

Eivissa, Balearic Islands, Spain

The Cathedral of Santa Maria of Ibiza stands at the highest point of Dalt Vila, Ibiza's fortified old town....

Cave of Saint Ignatius, Manresa

Catalonia, Spain

Within Manresa’s sanctuary complex, the small cave associated with Ignatius of Loyola remains a place of prayer....

Church of El Pilar de la Mola

El Pilar de la Mola, Formentera, Balearic Islands, Spain

The Church of El Pilar de la Mola is the active Roman Catholic parish of the village on Formentera's eastern plateau....

Church of Saint Mary of Eunate

Muruzábal, Navarre, Spain

Off a quiet detour from the Camino Francés near Muruzábal, Eunate stands by itself in open farmland: an octagonal Romanesque church wrapped in a gallery of thirty-three...

Church of San Miguel de Lillo

Oviedo, Asturias, Spain

Consecrated in 848 by King Ramiro I and his wife Paterna as the chapel of their Monte Naranco palace complex, San Miguel de Lillo survives today only as its western third...

Church of Sant Antoni de Portmany

Sant Antoni de Portmany, Balearic Islands, Spain

Overlooking the harbor at the heart of Sant Antoni de Portmany, this fortified parish church has stood since the early 14th century, when the Archbishop of Tarragona...

Church of Sant Francesc Xavier

Sant Francesc Xavier, Formentera, Balearic Islands, Spain

The parish church of Sant Francesc Xavier is the plain, thick-walled heart of Formentera's capital, raised between 1726 and the late 1730s to serve a resettled island...

Church of Sant Miquel de Balansat

Sant Miquel de Balansat, Balearic Islands, Spain

The Church of Sant Miquel de Balansat is an active Roman Catholic parish dedicated to Saint Michael the Archangel....

Church of Santa María del Naranco

Oviedo, Asturias, Spain

Commissioned around 842 by King Ramiro I of Asturias as the ceremonial hall of his hillside palace, this two-story loggia building later became a Catholic church dedicated...

Church of the Pilgrim Virgin, Pontevedra

Pontevedra, Pontevedra, Spain

Built between 1778 and 1794, the Church of the Pilgrim Virgin takes the shape of a scallop shell — the emblem carried by every walker of the Camino de Santiago....

Convent of Saint Teresa, Ávila

Ávila, Ávila, Spain

A 17th-century Baroque church and convent raised over the room where Teresa of Ávila was born in 1515, now an active Discalced Carmelite site holding her relics in a crypt...

Convent of San Antón, Castrojeriz

Castrojeriz, Burgos, Spain

Roofless and half-collapsed since the eighteenth century, the Convent of San Antón stands directly astride the Camino Francés outside Castrojeriz, its Gothic arch spanning...

Ermita de Betlem

Artà, Balearic Islands, Spain

Ermita de Betlem sits some nine kilometers into the hills above Artà, on a hermitage founded in 1805 by monks who built over an old watchtower and named the place for the...

Ex-Collegiate Church of Santa María del Manzano

Castrojeriz, Burgos, Spain

Beneath Castrojeriz's hilltop castle, this ex-collegiate church holds a 13th-century Gothic Virgin whose name recalls a founding legend of discovery in an apple tree....

Garabandal

Rionansa, Cantabria, Spain

In the Cantabrian Mountains of northern Spain, a village of stone houses holds an unusual place among Marian apparition sites....

Jaca Cathedral

Jaca, Huesca, Spain

Begun around 1076 under King Sancho Ramírez, Jaca Cathedral is among the oldest Romanesque cathedrals in Spain and the principal waypoint for pilgrims descending the...

Leon

León, León, Spain

León Cathedral stands as the purest expression of Gothic light theology in Spain....

Monastery of La Rábida

Palos de la Frontera, Huelva, Spain

A modest Gothic-Mudéjar friary on a solitary promontory above the Tinto and Odiel rivers, La Rábida has held a continuous Franciscan community since a 1412 papal charter....

Monastery of Leyre

Yesa, Zaragoza, Spain

Beneath the Sierra de Leyre, a half-buried Romanesque crypt and a Benedictine church hold the remains of the kings who founded Navarre....

Monastery of Piedra

Nuévalos, Zaragoza, Spain

Founded in 1194 when Cistercian monks from Poblet settled a former Moorish castle in the Aragonese hills, the Monastery of Piedra functioned as an austere monastic house...

Monastery of Samos

Samos, Lugo, Spain

Set in a river valley ringed by mountains in Lugo province, the Monastery of Samos has hosted Benedictine monastic life, with interruptions, since the 6th or 7th century....

Monastery of San Jerónimo, Granada

Granada, Granada, Spain

Founded by the Catholic Monarchs immediately after the 1492 fall of Granada, the Monastery of San Jerónimo was built as the city's first Christian monastic house and as...

Monastery of San Juan de la Peña

Santa Cruz de la Serós, Huesca, Spain

The Royal Monastery of San Juan de la Peña is built directly beneath an overhanging Pyrenean cliff near Jaca, Aragón....

Monastery of San Lorenzo de El Escorial

San Lorenzo de El Escorial, Madrid, Spain

Built by Philip II after his 1557 victory at Saint-Quentin, El Escorial fuses a working monastery, a royal mausoleum, and one of Catholic Christendom's largest relic...

Monastery of Santa María de la Valldigna

Simat de la Valldigna, Valencia, Spain

Tucked into a mountain-ringed valley of orange orchards south of Valencia, this thirteenth-century Cistercian monastery carries a rare double sacredness: it is dedicated...

Monastery of Santa María la Real de Nájera

Nájera, La Rioja, Spain

Beneath the church at Nájera, a rock-hewn cave is said to hold the spot where a king's falcon led him to a hidden image of the Virgin in 1044....

Monastery of Santo Domingo de Silos

Santo Domingo de Silos, Burgos, Spain

A working Benedictine abbey in rural Castile, built around the tomb of an 11th-century reform abbot and a cloister ranked among the great works of Spanish Romanesque...

Monastery of Santo Toribio de Liébana, Camaleno, Spain

Camaleño, Cantabria, Spain

In a valley of the Picos de Europa mountains, a small Franciscan monastery houses a relic that defies simple categorization....

Monastery of Valvanera

Anguiano, La Rioja, Spain

Deep in the forested Sierra de la Demanda, Valvanera holds the image of Our Lady of Valvanera, Patroness of La Rioja since 1965....

Mondoñedo Cathedral

Mondoñedo, Lugo, Spain

Mondoñedo Cathedral is known locally as 'La Catedral Arrodillada'—the Kneeling Cathedral—for the unusually low, austere proportions of its Romanesque-to-Gothic nave....

Monte Toro Sanctuary

Es Mercadal, Balearic Islands, Spain

At 358 meters, Monte Toro is the only real summit on an otherwise low-lying island, and its church has been Menorca's spiritual center since the late thirteenth century....

Orihuela Cathedral

Orihuela, Alicante, Spain

Orihuela Cathedral is the episcopal seat of the Diocese of Orihuela-Alicante, built in Valencian Gothic style on the site of the city's principal mosque after the 1281...

Our Lady (Virgin) of Montserrat (La Moreneta)

Inside Santa Maria de Montserrat Abbey

Marganell, Barcelona, Spain

High on a serrated mountain above Catalonia, the Black Madonna of Montserrat has drawn pilgrims for over a thousand years....