Poland Pilgrimage!

I will begin by saying I loved Poland. This country was beautiful in nature and in history. Visiting Auschwitz and learning about Poland's perseverance and intensity through World War II gave the feeling of an old and emotionally worn out country, but that strength through all those difficult times made me fall in love with her :)

Our Poland pilgrimage began at 8:30pm on Thursday night. Our bus ride was approximately 9 hours long so it was an overnight trip. Sleeping was a struggle - no deep sleep involved and to make matters worse we arrived in Czestochowa and the first thing we did upon exiting the bus was sprint to the Basilica for the unveiling of Our Lady of Czestochowa. Can you imagine... seeing a huge group of about 100 students sprinting across Czestochowa, Poland at 6:00 in the morning? Quote from Andrea during the sprint, "I feel like we're in the army." Haha :) The unveiling was beautiful though, it lasted all about 3 minutes but there were trumpets going and everything!

Here's one of our first views on our sprint

We ate breakfast at the hotel where the buses dropped us off. Sister Monica then gave us an overview/explanation of the Black Madonna (Our Lady of Czestochowa) and her significance and importance to the Polish people, before mass at the image chapel, "Shrine of the Polish Nation" at 8:45am. After mass we had some time to explore the church and surrounding areas before needing to be back at the bus at 10:30. There was a man selling us wooden pictures of the Madonna and he was accepting American money! Andrea had some and what a surprise it was to see American money again! A sack lunch was provided for us on our 2 hour bus ride to Auschwitz. We went on a long tour upon arriving at the largest Nazi concentration camp in all of Europe. It lasted about 2 1/2 hours and included Auschwitz and Birkenau. It was an intense experience which cut deep into the nature of evil and the horrors that man is capable of. It is so critical that we study the holocaust and other sobering events throughout history though because as George Santayana said: "Those who do not know their history, are doomed to repeat it." With this knowledge, we left Auschwitz in sadness but also with a sense of hope as well, because we are shown that horrible events can in fact end. We prayed a Divine Mercy Chaplet at the holocaust monument. At 4:30pm we departed for Krakow and arrived there at about 7pm. We ate dinner at Hotel Cracovia where we would be staying for two nights. Just Sarah and I roomed together so Andrea could be with our friend, Lydia. We walked out into town for some wine and had a little get-together in our room. We got to bed by 11pm which was a little later then I wanted since we had been up most of the night before while we were traveling... but it is what it is, and we had a good time!

It's late now so I'm going to continue writing about Poland tomorrow :)