In Władysław Reymont’s Noble Prize-winning book Chłopi(The Peasants: Summer)one of the central female characters named Hanka says “I have vowed to go to Częstochowa for Our Lady of the Angels.” The gospel gives several connections between angels and the Blessed Virgin Mary such as the Annunciation when Mary is told she would become the mother of Jesus; the appearance of angels to the shepherds at the birth of Jesus; the angel informing Joseph that he is to flee with God’s child into Egypt. Reference is also made in the much-loved Litany of Loreto (Litania Loretanska, in Polish) which intones “Queen of Angels, pray for us.” (Królowa Aniołow, modł sie za nami) but as a feast day, I was unfamiliar with Our Lady of the Angels. Hanka (or rather her creator, Władysław Reymont) was referring to The Feast Day of Our Lady of the Angels also known as the Portiuncula (Porcjunkuli, in Polish), observed on August 2nd. The story begins in Assisi, Italy and with St. Francis of Assisi. During the first centuries of the Christian era, pilgrims returning from the Holy Land built a small chapel at the foot of the mountain on which Assisi, Italy is situated. This chapel together with a small plot of land was later given to St Benedict in the 6th century and given the name Portiuncula, meaning, Little Portion. In 1209, St. Francis obtained from the Benedictines the use of the Portiuncula, for which he apparently paid the sum total of a basket of fish. He set about restoring what had become a dilapidated chapel, was joined by others, gave it the name Our Lady of the Angels and is considered to be the cradle, the beginning of the Franciscan order: the Order of Friars Minor (O.F.M). One night, while praying in the chapel, St. Francis saw our Lord and His holy mother surrounded by angels and heard the voice of the Lord saying He would grant St. Francis some special request. After a few moments of reflection, St. Francis asked that anyone visiting his little sanctuary, who were contrite and having confessed their sins, receive a plenary indulgence, that is, a pardon, a forgiveness of their sins. (The Miracle of the Porziuncola. Painting by Antonio de Oliveria Bernardes(1698) Cathedral of Evora, Portugal)
St. Francis petitioned the pope to be able to offer this spiritual boon to the faithful. It was granted with the restriction that the indulgence could be gained on that one day of the year, on 2nd of August, that being the anniversary of the little chapel's dedication. It became a holiday celebrated by all Franciscans around the world as the patronal feast day of the Franciscan church and monasteries. The conditions for forgiveness included: confession of sins, attending mass, receiving holy communion, the recitation of the Lord's Prayer or some reaffirmation of one’s Christian beliefs. From that time on, the Portiuncula, the little chapel also called Our Lady of the Angels, became the site of numerous pilgrimages by devout individuals seeking pardon for their sins. It became known as the Pardon of Assisi and was later extended throughout the universal Church and not limited just to the pilgrimage site in Assisi. Anyone participating in a pilgrimage or attending their parish church on this day could unburden their sins and receive forgiveness. Władysław Reymont lived, observed and wrote in the little village of Lipce where the setting for Chłopi (The Peasants) take place. He began writing in 1897. The fourth and last book in the sequence, “Summer”, was first published in the Polish language in 1909 making it clear that over a hundred years ago, the feast day of Our Lady of the Angels was an important part of the spiritual practices of the Łowicz region in Poland. Struggling to manage the house and farm singlehandedly while her husband was in jail, fears of her losing her husband’s affection, and troubled by her feelings of hurt and anger and inadequacy, the character Hanka sought refuge, solace and forgiveness, by taking a pilgrimage, a spiritual journey to a sacred space on that special feast day. In Poland, that most sacred space was (and still is) Częstochowa. She sought comfort for what ailed her heart and soul… in her faith… on the feast day of Our Lady of the Angels on August 2nd.
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You’re most likely to see a statue of him near rivers and bridges. He is known as the patron saint of water, bridges, and of farmers who have fields they want to protect against floods. He is often found near wells and springs, watching that they not dry out. He is also considered the patron saint of the drowning with his statue erected at sites of a drowning. Today, May 16, is the feast day of St. Jan Nepomucen. (Święty Jan Nepomucen). Born in Nepomuc, Bohemia near Prague, St. John was and ardent minister who was murdered by King Wenceslaus IV when he refused to reveal what he had been told in confession. The king ordered that his hands and feet be bound and weighed down with rocks and thrown into from a bridge into the Vlatva River in Prague in the middle of the night. The year of his death was 1393. The cult of St. John Nepomucen began to spread in Prague soon after his tragic death. In 1638, even before his beatification, a statue of St. John Nepomucen was erected on the Charles Bridge in Prague. The figure depicts the saint standing in priest’s clothes consisting of a cassock, surplice and stole, his head covered with a traditional priest’s biret and a nimbus of five stars surrounding the head. In one arm he cradles a crucifix and in the other holds a palm, the traditional symbol of martyrdom. It is this image that is the most widely reproduced of St. John Nepomucen throughout all of Poland . The Jesuits promoted St. John Nepomucen throughout the known continents as the patron saint of a good confession. He is patron saint of confessors and those who wish to control their tongue from excessive talking so he is sometimes depicted with a finger against his lips in the traditional symbol of silence or sometimes holding a padlock. Sometimes he holds an open prayer book in both hands. Considering the great number of shrines dedicated to this saint, it is clear he is much loved and venerated in Poland. Top photo: Wikipedia. Lower photo: by author in Baranow Sandomierski, Poland Over the centuries, the Feast of St. Andrew, celebrated on the night of the 29th through the 30th of November, stole the limelight from that of another saint. In Polish customs and tradition, it was a night of magic and fortune telling observed by young marriageable girls to divine who their future husbands might be. This custom, called andrzjeki, was once the province of just young girls but over time included young men and became what amounted to be a party with lots of teasing and merriment. Completely forgotten was St. Catherine of Alexandria, the third century virgin and martyr, who from the time of the Middle Ages, was the patron saint of young men and pious bachelors and patroness of a successful marriage in Polish tradition. It was on the evening of her feast day on November 24th into the 25th, that young men sought to determine something about their future marriage partners. The custom was called katarzynki, after Katarzyna, the Polish name for Catherine. On this night, young men curious about their future paid special attention to their dreams: a white hen - meant a wedding with a maiden; a black hen - a wedding with a widow; a hen with chicks - marrying a widow with children; an owl - meant a wise but unmerry wife; a pigeon – a wife that was sweet and kind, but unfortunately, not too bright: a gray horse meant he would remain a bachelor for life. Just as important as finding out her marital status and personality characteristics, was finding out her name. The men used a similar method as the girls during their night of St. Andrew's fortune-telling. Instead of cards with the image of St. Andrew , used by the girls, young men used holy cards with the image of St. Catherine, and on the back of the cards wrote the names of females they were interested in and placed them under their pillow overnight. This action gives understanding to the Polish proverb, “W noc świętej Katarzyny, pod poduszką są dziewczyny,” meaning, “On the eve of St. Catherine, the girls are under the pillow.” In the morning one of the cards would be drawn blindly from under the pillow to determine the name of the future wife. Having learned these details about their future bride, there was still another detail to discover: would all this happen soon? To find out, it was necessary to cut a cherry branch (and some sources say apple or other fruit bearing tree) and put it in the water on Saint Catherine's day. If the branch bloomed by Christmas, it meant a wedding soon and a happy marriage. In the end, as patroness of young bachelors and happy marriages, it was recommended that the young men attend church or a chapel and pray to St. Catherine for help and guidance in matters of the heart. In Christian iconography, St. Catherine of Alexandria is always depicted with a wheel, the instrument of her torture and a palm, the symbol of martyrdom. Her image was often adopted as the crest for various noble families and for Polish towns and villages, such as the one above for Nowy Targ in southern Poland. Google image. She is the patron saint of marriages, mothers, widows, bakers and sailors. In paintings and iconography she is often depicted with the Virgin Mary as a girl or with the Virgin Mary and little Jesus such as the one shown above, painted by Leonardo de Vinci in 1508, now hanging in the Louvre Museum in Paris. One of the most famous churches carrying her name can be found in Vilnius, the capital city of Lithuania. Formerly known as Wilno, the city was at one time part of the Polish-Lithuanian empire until the partitions of Poland. The church was built by Polish King Aleksander Jagiellonczyk beginning in 1501, right within the same time period as Leonardo was struggling to pay homage in his own vision of the saint. In much later years, it was said that even Napoleon, after seeing the church during the Franco-Russian war in 1812, coveted the architectural jewel built of 33 different kinds of brick. In Poland, Saint Anne enjoys unflagging popularity with 184 churches built in her honor as well as numerous sanctuaries, the largest located southeast of Opole in Silesia and called Górze Świętej Anny, the Mountain(or Hill) of St. Anne. The Franciscan monastery and the Church of St. Anne, built in 1209 and sitting high at 1,263 feet above sea level, is a unique place of worship visited by thousands of pilgrims each year. They are drawn by the miraculous figure located on the main altar known as Św. Anna Samotrzecia, the word "samotrzecia" an old Polish word meaning threesome or three of us, roughly meaning the St. Anne Threesome: the three figures of St. Anne, with her daughter Mary and grandson Jesus, in her arms. (below) Yet, we do not find any word of Anne in the New Testament. The only information about her comes from apocryphal writings, that is, writings from the beginning of Christianity by unknown individuals, and subsequently of doubtful authenticity but remains part of the church traditions. The writings say that Anne was from Bethlehem and married a wealthy young man from Nazareth named Joachim. They were devoted to one another but their happiness was marred by the lack of children. They prayed for a child but years passed without an answer. Anne was considered barren when at the age of 45 an angel appeared announcing that they will become parents. In gratitude for the gift of an offspring, the parents offered their only child, Mary, later known as the Blessed Virgin Mary, to God. The cult of Saint Anne appeared around the 4th century and expanded over time with increasing reverence towards the Virgin Mary. It was born among those who wished to place themselves in the care of the mother of the Blessed Virgin Mary and grandmother of Jesus. Families, brides, spouses, women expecting offspring, childless women, mothers, grandmothers and widows placed themselves under her care and protection. It is generally acknowledged that St. Anne was born on a Tuesday. In the folklore of the people of the Tarnów-Rzeszów region of Poland, it is believed that whosoever burns a candle to St. Anne every Tuesday throughout the night and prays to her, will not be afflicted by poverty. The successful marriage of St. Anne is reflected in the Polish proverb that says, "Szczęśliwy kto na świętą Annę wyszuka sobie pannę" "Fortunate is the man who finds himself a young woman on the Feast of St. Anne." Happy name day to all Anne's, Anna's, and Hanna's and the numerous variations in Polish such as Ania, Anka, Hanka, Hania. Google images The Feast of Three Kings (January 6) was at one time called Małe Boze Narodzenia, i.e., Little Christmas, in Poland because gifts were often given to children on this day in honor of the Three Kings who brought the gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh to the Infant Jesus. The Feast Day was a very popular motif in Polish paintings, sculpture, stained glass and folk art. This first image is by Polish artist Teodor Baltazar Stachowicz(1800-1873) titled Pokłon Trzech Króli - Adoration of the Magi (circa 1820's). The artist himself was born on the feast day. This bas-relief shown below originally comes from the well known St. Mary's Church(Kosciół Mariacki) in Kraków and is dated to the years 1460-1470. It comes from the workshop of Jakub of Sącz, also known as the Master of the Holy Trinity Triptych. After being located in various churches in Kraków it finally found a permanent home at the Archdiocesan Museum in the name of Cardinal Karol Wojtyła also in Kraków. Artist Józef Mehoffer(1869-1946) practiced a variety of arts, but excelled in stained glass windows that can be found in structures throughout Kraków. He found international acclaim for designing the 13 stained glass windows of the Cathedral of St. Nicholas in Fribourg, Switzerland. The work took 40 years to complete and is now felt to be the most important collection of religious Art Nouveau in stained-glass windows. Among the 13 windows is the Homage of the Thee Kings. Decorative paper cutting in Poland is called wycinanki, meaning "cutting out" and was widespread as a peasant craft in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The paper cuttings were often used to adorn the interior walls and ceiling beams of peasant cottages. The various types of cutouts and the subject matter can range from birds and animals to country and religious scenes. Here is a beautiful example of a tribute to the Three Kings from the Kurpie region of Poland. A Polish proverb for the Feast of Three Kings: " W święto Trzech Króli człek się w kożuch tuli" On the feast of Three Kings man cuddles in his sheepskin coat. Google images. Feast of St. Lucy: Św. Łucji December 13. During the ancient times of the Julian calendar, December 13 was celebrated as the winter solstice, the official beginning of winter, marked by being the shortest day of the year and the longest night of the year. From then on, the days slowly become longer and the nights shorter. In 1582, when Pope Gregory the XIII changed the calendar to what we now know as the Gregorian calendar, the date of the winter solstice was changed to December 23. In today's times we recognize December 13 as the feast of St. Lucy, a third century martyr, who dedicated her virginity to God and died a terrible death when she refused to marry. Remnants of the old Julian calendar still remain in some old Polish proverbs, passed on orally through the generations, as in : " Swięta Łucja dnia przyrzuca. "The day(light) arrives with St. Lucy. and "Święto Łuci noc króci." St. Lucy shortens the night. Perhaps the ancient celebration of the return of longer days, of light and increased sun, critical for bringing life back to trees and plants necessary for life accounts for this particular Polish custom: On the day before the feast of St. Lucy, the girls place a branch of a cherry tree in a bottle filled with water and keep it in the window up to Christmas day. If the branch is covered in blossoms by this day, she will shortly marry. If not, she will remain single for a while yet.( Stanislaw Ciszewski. Lud Rolniczo-górniczy z okolic Sławkowa Powiecie Olkuskim. Kraków.1887) For others not looking for marriage prognostications, the blooms signify good luck and prosperity. The success and failure of crops were (and still are!) so weather dependent that the day was also used to foretell future weather such as in the proverb: "Święta Łucja głosi, jaką pogodę styczeń przynosi." St. Lucy announces what the weather will be in January. The twelve days, beginning with the Feast of St. Lucy on December 13 until December 24, were carefully noted for each of those twelve days predicted what the weather will be throughout the upcoming twelve months of the year. The feast day also officially marked the beginning of preparation for Christmas in earnest. Natalia Tułaszewicz (1906-1945) on the Feast Day of the 108 Blessed Polish Martyrs of World War II6/12/2018 A school teacher and a member of the underground resistance, Natalia Tułasiewicz was a passionate member of the Catholic lay apostolate of Poland during World War II. In 1943, she voluntarily signed up to be sent to the Third Reich as a forced laborer in order to give spiritual guidance and comfort to other female forced laborers. In Hanover, Germany she worked at a factory that specialized in making artist paints and inks. Suffering from the constant hunger, cold and the exhaustion that was the fate of Polish forced laborer, she faithfully lead the laborers in prayer and song, provided religious instruction and held small retreats devoted to prayer and meditation. In 1944, when the Germans found out about her secret mission, she was arrested, interrogated, and tortured. In September of that year she was condemned to death and sent to Ravensbruck concentration camp, number 75188. In spite of being increasingly weak and suffering from tuberculosis, she continued her ministry among the women of Ravensbruck. She was sent to the gas chamber on Holy Saturday, March 31, 1945, thirty days before the liberation of Ravensbruck . She expressed her beliefs in her spiritual diary, where she wrote: "My mission is to show the world that the path to holiness also travels through noisy markets and streets, not only in monasteries or in quiet families." She was beatified by Pope John Paul II in 1999. Her name is among the 108 Blessed Polish Martyrs of World War II, one of two lay women so recognized. Eternal rest, grant unto her, O Lord, and let the perpetual light shine upon her. Google image. Today is January 24, Feast of St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622) known in Poland as Św. Franciszek Salezy. I'm working on a little meditation journal for myself, collecting thoughts and quotes mostly for the fun of it but also as a way of finding inspiration and ideas for things that maybe someday I'll write about. I've been doing it for a while now and there are tons of resources but I decided I wanted to look for inspiration among my own tribe, my own people, so I'm reading books and diaries of Poles who lived in previous centuries and who felt it important to commit their thoughts to paper. I also like looking at the calendar in the morning to see which saint is being celebrated that day by the Catholic Church, people of my own faith who lived and died and left their particular legacy. Both sources are filled with examples of amazing individuals full of determination and fortitude who, once they found their groove, their star to follow, were unshakable in their purpose. The very earliest saints left us their life as an example to follow but many of the later saints like St. Francis de Sales were also able to leave us their thoughts and words. He was a prolific writer, using his skill to bring people back into the church and gave spiritual direction through letters, pamphlets and books. As a spiritual advisor he wrote to his advisee Bishop Jeane-Pierre Camus: Have patience with all things, but, first of all with yourself. In his book The Introduction to the Devout Life he writes: Make occasional retreats into the solitude of your heart, whilst outwardly engaged in business or conversation. And even back then, four centuries ago, he advises: Half an hour's meditation each day is essential except when you are busy. Then a full hour is needed. I also like: Great works do not always come our way but every moment presents us with opportunities to do little ones with excellence. The quote that resonates with me the most and has become part of my journal is this one: "Be who you are, and be that well, in order to bring honor to the Master Craftsman whose handiwork we are." St. Francis de Sales is the patron saint of Catholic writers, the Catholic press, and journalists. Google image. |
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One of the biggest moments in my life was being able to sign for my very own library card. When I'm not reading, researching and writing I'm riding my bike, sewing or gardening. I love flea markets, folk art, and traveling to Poland.
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