Over 200,000 Attend International Pilgrimage to Zarvanytsia
Zarvanytsia - On 7-8 August 2004, Love and Forgiveness, an international
pilgrimage, took place in the western Ukrainian village of Zarvanytsia
(Ternopil region). The Marian shrine was visited by 220,000 pilgrims
from eastern and western Ukraine , Poland , Denmark , the USA , England
, Germany , the Czech Republic , Kazakhstan , and other countries.
A candle-light procession and pontifical Liturgy were led by Cardinal
Lubomyr Husar, head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGCC), and
Cardinal Jozef Glemp, Roman Catholic primate of Poland , assisted by
15 Roman and Greek Catholic bishops.
The pilgrims prayed for the peaceful, Christian co-existence of the
Polish and Ukrainian nations and so that historic misunderstandings between
the two nations be left in the past.
In their address to the pilgrims, the two cardinals emphasized the necessity
to forget the wrongs of the past and to progress towards
reconciliation, like the nations of Germany , France and Poland have. "We are called
to live in peace, because we are God's children," said Cardinal Husar
to the pilgrims.
The year 2004 has been declared the "Year of Poland in Ukraine ." The
UGCC and the Roman Catholic bishops of Poland have scheduled
a number of events as part of this celebration in order to deepen the
good traditions of understanding between the two nations. The pilgrimage
to Zarvanytsia was one such event.
Source: press-secretariat of the Ternopil-Zboriv eparchy of the UGCC,
www.risu.org.ua
|
|
