Churchpop is reporting on the daylong event which took place in Poland on October 7, the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary and the anniversary of the miraculous victory of the Christian navy over invading Muslim forces at the Battle of Lepanto in 1571.
Hundreds of thousands of Poles from parishes throughout the country gathered along the nation’s 2,000 mile border at 2:00 p.m. to pray the Rosary for peace and for “Europe to remain Europe.”
Although official numbers are not yet available, an estimated one million people took part in the initiative which was organized by a lay organization known as the Solo Dios Basta Foundation, which means God Alone Suffices.
The nation’s clergy were also fully supportive of the measure.
Rev. Paweł Rytel-Andrianik, spokesman for the Polish Bishops’ Conference, told The New York Times (NYT) it was the second-largest prayer event in Europe after the 2016 World Youth Day.
“During the prayer, I was at the Chopin airport in Warsaw, and there were so many people that they were pouring out of the chapel,” Father Rytel-Andrianik told the NYT. “This was an initiative started by lay people, which makes it even more extraordinary. Millions of people prayed the rosary together. This exceeded the boldest expectations of the organizers.”
At Mass that morning, Krakow’s Archbishop Marek Jedraszewski, during his sermon that people should pray for “Europe to remain Europe.”
“Let’s pray for other nations of Europe and the world to understand that we need to return to the Christian roots of European culture if we want Europe to remain Europe,” Archbishop Jedraszewski said.
Those who could not physically attend the event were invited to pray from their homes. Because an estimated 90 percent of Poland’s 38 million people are Catholic, it is estimated that millions more were participating in the event from a distance.
Other organizations from around the world, iincluding Women of Grace, also joined the movement to pray for world peace.
“Through this unprecedented prayer of the Rosary,” the event's website explains, “we want to show the faithfulness and obedience of Mary, who tirelessly calls us to recite the Rosary. We also want to apologize and pay for all blasphemy and insults against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. We wish to implore for the intercession of the Mother of God to save Poland and the world.”
