Filialkirche Maria Fieberbründl

Maria Fieberbründl is a small Roman Catholic pilgrimage church in the village of Kaibing, part of the Feistritztal municipality in the Austrian province of Styria. It stands beside a healing spring that once drew pilgrims to a simple wooden chapel with a statue of the Virgin. The present church, dedicated to the Nativity of Mary, was built between 1879 and 1894 to plans by Robert Mirkowics, with local craftsmen such as Johann Lang and Josef Falk contributing the masonry and timber tower. The site became an important pilgrimage destination after reports of answered prayers between 1880 and 1883. In 1882 it was raised to the status of a filial church of St Johann bei Herberstein, and daily masses were permitted from 1883. A long wooden Bethalle was added in 1893–94, leaving a seven-metre gap that may have allowed pilgrims to sleep beneath its open roof. In 1954 the Capuchins from Vienna united the chapel and Bethalle into a single building under a new south portal crowned by a Schutzmantelmadonna by the sculptor Pabst. Inside, the church presents a light-filled nave with flat pilasters and an exposed roof of standing trusses on carved brackets. A round arch leads to a transept under a barrel vault, and another arch opens into the 1879 choir with its cross-ribbed vault and recessed apse. The high altar and music gallery display historicist votive paintings, while a modern Bründl chapel houses newer ex-votos. A statue of the fountain Virgin dates from 1954, and Franz Weiss painted the frescoes in the chapel in 1978.