The Catholic National Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham has announced it has received a donation of £4 million for its building development fund. The shrine, which dates back to the 11th century, is seeking to raise £6 million to improve its facilities, with plans including the development of upgraded pilgrim accommodation, new accommodation for the disabled, a retreat centre and a wet weather cloister. Speaking on Monday at Walsingham’s Chapel of Reconciliation, Mgr John Armitage, the rector of the shrine, said the donation showed that “in a very short period of time great things can happen”. “When I left on December 28 for my holidays I did not expect when I came back I would bring £4 million towards the building fund,” he said. “We have been greatly blessed that a donor has given to the building fund this remarkable sum of money. So let’s give thanks to this great generosity of this particular donor.”He added that the donation meant that there is £1.6 million left to raise towards the building fund. “It is a great blessing on the shrine and please pray for the donor who is very sick at the moment,” Mgr Armitage said. The shrine is also seeking to raise a separate £4 million to develop its work. This would involve a live stream of daily Mass and other events through a media centre provisionally called Walsingham TV. Other parts of the plan include a national family pilgrimage and a pilgrimage for young people. Mgr Armitage is also hoping to commission a canvas for a series of artworks depicting the history of England through the saints, which would be hung in the cloister. Last summer, when Mgr Armitage made the initial appeal, he said he hoped to raise the money from across the globe. He said: “This is a national shrine, and we’re seeing how we can fund it nationally. But we get groups from all over the world, and in the past week we’ve had Melkites from the Middle East and the ordinariate on the same day, a Punjabi group from the Midlands and a group from the Caribbean.” Mgr Armitage said the shrine had also received enquiries from the United States from people wishing to help. The shrine was suppressed during the Reformation and its disused chapel was used successively as a poor house, a forge, a barn and a cowshed. Charlotte Pearson Boyd, a Catholic convert, bought the building from a farmer in 1897 and restored it. On August 15, 1934, Mass was celebrated publicly in the Slipper Chapel for the first time in 400 years. Shortly afterwards, Walsingham was named the Catholic National Shrine of Our Lady. The Dutch scholar Erasmus visited the shrine at the start of the 16th century. It was then the second most important pilgrimage destination in the country after Canterbury. “When you look in,” he wrote, “you would say it is the abode of saints, so brilliantly does it shine with gems, gold and silver. “Our Lady stands in the dark at the right side of the altar ... a little image, remarkable neither for its size, material nor workmanship.”