Jasna Góra Monastery -- Visiting the Black Madonna 12/1/14

Panoramic View of  the Jasna Góra Monastery

Starszy Allen in front of the Jasna Góra Monastery

People travel from all over Europe (and especially from all over Poland) to come see the painting of the Black Madonna.  Some people in Poland firmly believe that Mary was a Polish woman. 

Here's what Wikipedia says about the monastery & painting:


 The Jasna Góra Monastery in Częstochowa,Poland, is the most famous Polish shrine to the Virgin Mary and the country's greatest place of pilgrimage – for many its spiritual capital. The image of the Black Madonna of Częstochowa, also known as Our Lady of Częstochowa, to which miraculous powers are attributed, is Jasna Góra's most precious treasure.[1]

Sign outside the gate in many languages

Letter from a week before:

Dear Mom,

I feel bad not being able to send as long as an email in reply as you do to me!

But things are going well.

The tracting thing is going well. I will tell you more about it in my voice recording that I send next week.

Today for P-Day we went and played Squash. It's like european raquet-ball. It was interesting. The ball isn't like a raquet-ball though. It's small and not as bouncy. So that's not as fun.

Transfer calls are this saturday. I will find out where I will be for the rest of my mission. I hope I stay in Kraków. That would be super awesome. We will see, I guess.

Let's see, what else happened this week. hmm. Oh, I went on an exchange in Wrocław. That was cool. Wrocław is really pretty. I can't think of anything else super exciting that happened this week.

Oh! There was a multi-branch YSA activity here in Kraków on Saturday. YSA's came from Kielce and Katowice. It went well. It was a christmas party and it was fun.

I am sending my christmas package home tomorrow. The gifts aren't as extravagent as they were last year. They will also be unwrapped. So I will have to tell you which ones are for who.

You should start sending me the weather again each week so I can no how cold it is going to be and if it will snow.

I haven't gotten a christmas package from you yet. Did you send it already? And where did you send it to?

I love you! :)

Love,
Drake

Panoramic hoto of Częstochowa"Jasna Góra - panorama z Bastionu św. Rocha" by Jaroslaw Jankowski DG at pl.wikipedia. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Jasna_G%C3%B3ra_-_panorama_z_Bastionu_%C5%9Bw._Rocha.jpg#mediaviewer/File:Jasna_G%C3%B3ra_-_panorama_z_Bastionu_%C5%9Bw._Rocha.jpg