Can I see St. Margaret Mary's body at Paray-le-Monial?

By Andrew McGilly, Founder of Bold Pilgrim · Updated 2026-10-08

Not an intact body. St. Margaret Mary Alacoque rests in the Chapel of the Apparitions at the Visitation monastery in Paray-le-Monial, Burgundy, and what pilgrims see at the side altar is a reliquary holding a wax effigy of the saint together with most of her bones. It is the chapel where she reported the apparitions of the Sacred Heart, and it is open to pilgrims for prayer.

She died in the monastery on October 17, 1690, and her tomb was opened in 1830 in the course of her cause. Catholic press coverage of the 2026 relic tour reported that her brain was found preserved when the tomb was opened, which helps explain why she appears on some lists of 'incorruptibles' even though what rests at Paray is bones within a wax figure, not a preserved body.

Portions of her relics travel. In 2026 a reliquary with a clavicle, two ribs and a small portion of the brain was brought to the United States, with the approval of the bishop of Autun and of the Holy See's office for the causes of saints, for the bishops' consecration of the country to the Sacred Heart.

Good to know before you go: the Chapel of the Apparitions is one of four places pilgrims visit in Paray. The others are the Basilica of the Sacred Heart, the Chapel of Saint John, and the Chapel of La Colombière, which holds the relics of her confessor, St. Claude La Colombière. The Chapel of the Apparitions belongs to an enclosed community of Visitation nuns, so the cloister is not open to visitors. The sanctuary publishes the opening and Mass times for all four places on its own website; read them the week you go, because they change with the season.

Can I see St. Margaret Mary's body at Paray-le-Monial?

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