Four years later, legend has it, angels moved the shrine to its present Loreto location, about 15 miles south of the Italian port city of Ancona. Today, those miraculous movements are commemorated with a medal depicting Our Lady of Loreto on one side and an airplane on the other. And people coming to the chapel at O'Hare, Jamnicky says, often request that medal, as well as prayers and holy cards. Indeed, this busiest airport in the world handled 66,468,269 flyers in 1994 an average of 182,104 per day. So, that could mean a minimum of 1,821 folks feel fidgety on any given day.
Some towns nearby offer yet another patron for fretful fliers.
St. Joseph of Cupertino, it seems, spent much of his life flying around towns not far from the Holy House. Or maybe the easy way, since God filed the flight plan. At any rate, we're told that John Frederick, the duke of Brunswick, once saw Joseph rise into the air during Mass, with the saint's feet rising higher even than the top of the altar. Deeply moved, the Protestant noble promptly asked to be received into the Catholic Church. Joseph, in his ecstasies, certainly didn't mind flying or, to give it the proper religious term, levitating.