The building of the Church of Our Lady of Graces was started in 1641 at the instigation of the Parish Priest Don Francesco Piscopo and was completed in 1660 according to another. A Maltese proverb says “a church is never finished”, which is another way of stating that the people in a particular parish are never satisfied with their own church and, depending on their means, are forever the ambition that the church in one’s village be better and bigger than the church in the next parish. The good people of Zabbar are no exception.
Largely from the private funds of the Parish Priest Andrea Buhagiar, in addition to money collected from the people of Zabbar, work on embellishing the church was started in 1738.
The Maltese architect Giovanni Bonavia redesigned the façade and two belltowers were erected; in addition the church was paved in marble and provided with a crypt. The main painting of the Madonna and Child is a work by the painter Alessio Erardi (1669-1727).
