Jasna Gora, the Polish sanctuary [Photo (c) PAULINIANUM, postcard]

This monastery has an old icon called "Black Madonna", which is believed to have miraculous power. Millions of pilgrims come to Jasna Gora from all over the country (more than 90 percent of the Poles are Catholic), and many of them on foot.

There is also an altar dedicated to a priest killed in Auschwitz in order to save another prisoner. The priest was canonized as St. Maximilian Kolbe.

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September 6, 1999; last modified Jan. 13, 2003. Soshichi Uchii

suchii@bun.kyoto-u.ac.jp