Wallfahrtskirche Maria Schnee auf der Gleinalm

The Wallfahrtskirche Maria Schnee stands on the Gleinalpe in the Austrian province of Styria. It sits at 1 586 metres on the old pass road over the Gleinalmsattel, below the Speikkogel and close to the Gleinalmschutzhaus. The church belongs to the parish of Übelbach and traces its origins to the early 18th century. The building is worth reaching for its mountain setting and its long history of pilgrimage. Records from 1670 mention paid masses at the shelter, and the church itself was consecrated in 1711. Count Gottfried von Dietrichstein had it rebuilt in 1740. For much of the 18th and early 19th centuries regular Sunday and feast-day services were held during the cattle drives. In 1869 Julie von Öttingen-Wallerstein arranged with Stift Rein that masses would be celebrated only on five saints’ days, a custom still observed today. Inside, the single-nave church has a stone high altar as wide as the west wall, painted in the manner of Philipp Carl Laubmann. The altar shows the conversion of Saint Hubertus and the Roman Madonna from Santa Maria Maggiore. The pulpit is portable, and a carved group of the Crucifixion occupies a wall niche. A 1979 statue of Saint Joseph by a South Tyrolean craftsman stands in the porch. Outside, the west tower rises with a pointed spire, and the slopes around lead to the Speikkogel.