Catholic Church of the Visitation in the Jerusalem suburb of Ein Karem is named in honor of one of the most beautiful gospel episodes – visit Mary parish.

The angel who announced to Mary that She would conceive the Messiah, spoke about Her relative Elizabeth, "called barren," and now bears a son. According to Luke, the Evangelist, the virgin at once went "into the hill country, to a city of Judah" – where Elizabeth lived with her husband, the priest Zechariah. Surely Mary wanted not only to share the incredible news, but also to help the elderly woman. Elizabeth by this time already for the sixth month was concealed from people, avoiding, apparently, idle conversations.

The meeting of two pregnant was amazing. Young Mary greeted Elizabeth – you can imagine that She did it with respect. However, the older woman gave Her great honors. The Holy Spirit helped Elizabeth to understand Who she sees in front of him: "Blessed art Thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of Thy womb! Whence cometh the mother of my Lord comes to me? For when the voice of Your greeting reached my ears, the babe leaped with joy" (Luke 1:42-44). Leaped a baby was the future John the Baptist.

Three months Mary lived in "the city of Judah". It was present, Ein Karem. It is believed that the spot where stood the house of Zacharias, found during the excavations conducted in the fourth century in Jerusalem, the Holy St. Helena, mother of Emperor Constantine. Perhaps she had built the first Church there, where there was a meeting of Mary and Elizabeth. Later on the ruins of the crusaders erected a large two-story temple. It was abandoned when the Muslims when the crusaders were expelled from the Holy Land.

In 1679, the building was bought by the Franciscans. Reconstruction on the lower level of the Church began only in 1862. And in 1955 ended the final restoration of the Church. It was directed by Italian the Franciscan monk and architect of the Holy Land" Antonio Bellucci, who built and renovated there a lot of buildings.

Bellucci graced the upper temple painted ceilings in Tuscan style and frescoes dedicated to the virgin Mary. The frescoes in the lower Church depict scenes from the New Testament, including the massacre of the innocents. Joseph with Mary, rescuing the baby Jesus, then fled to Egypt, and the family of Zacharias stayed home. The Apocrypha say that Elizabeth's son hid from the soldiers of Herod in the rock for the stone. Stone, kept in the Church of the Visitation, tradition holds thereby. Here you can see the well from which, according to legend, drank Zechariah, Elizabeth and John.

Mosaic on the facade shows Mary visits Elizabeth. Near the entrance there is a sculptural group depicting their meeting. And on the wall – plates with translations into forty-two languages, including Vietnamese and Swahili, the text of the "Magnificat" (Magnificat anima mea Dominum). This glorification of the virgin Mary, which She said when Elizabeth recognized Her as the mother of God: "My soul magnifies the Lord, and rejoiced in My spirit about God My Savior..." (LK 1:46-47).