Black Madonna pilgrimage to Czestochowa begins

A group of Hungarian pilgrims left Budapest on Monday morning for the southern Polish town of Czestochowa, a religious site with the Black Madonna, a treasured icon kept in the Jasna Gora Monastery, the organisers of the pilgrimage tour said.

They will be joined by pilgrims from Transylvania to form a large group of 200, they told MTI, adding that at a time of a receding pandemic and a war nearby, such a pilgrimage was more needed than ever. It also serves to revive the centuries-long friendship of Poland and Hungary, they said.

“As Czestochowa is a Hungarian-founded religious site, it’s almost like we’re going home,” priest Antal Michels told MTI at the departure. “We are taking with us a lot of prayers for peace now with a war going on in neighbouring Ukraine.”