The reading
How it began
In 1578 Thomas sees a lady in light in the woods near the San river. She wants a church on that spot. The local authorities are slow; the image and the pilgrimages are not. The present basilica, with its organs and its crowned Madonna, is one of Poland’s quiet major shrines — less shouted than Częstochowa, as loved.
Reading
How to read Our Lady of Leżajsk
Poland’s Marian map is not one icon. Leżajsk is the forest apparition: Mary choosing a clearing, a woodcutter, a church that would have to be built by people who had little.
Pray this
Prayers that sit with the story
Church status
How this sign has been received
Church-approved
Crowned image, basilica, Bernardine custody. The apparition is in the founding history received by the Polish Church.
Sources
- Basilica of Our Lady of Leżajsk
- Bernardine Friars, Leżajsk
For the classroom
Our Lady of Leżajsk (1578, Leżajsk). Grade in this encyclopedia: Church-approved. A pious woodcutter, Thomas Michałek, sees Mary in the forest asking for a church. The image of Leżajsk is crowned, the basilica a Bernardine jewel of the Polish baroque, still a working pilgrimage.
