Black Madonna

Today is the solemnity of Our Lady of Częstochowa on Jasna Góra which has become the National Shrine in my country, the spiritual capital of Poland. Thousands if not millions of pilgrims come to Częstochowa day after day throughout the whole year from all over the country and abroad to pay homage to the undisputed Queen of Poland who, throughout the centuries, has showed the way and guided and protected our nation from her throne in Jasna Góra...


This is amazing that the image of Our Lady, revered in the Shrine on Jasna Góra, allegedly painted by St. Luke the Evangelist on  a cypress top of the table from the house of the Holy Family of Nazareth, is of a black woman, thus popularly known as Black Madonna of Częstochowa.

 

There is a famous song in Poland, praising Our Lady as Black Madonna, which lyrics in English are as follows:

There is a recess on this earth,
Where everybody wants to come back,
Where reigns Her face,
On the face - two cut scratches,
Eyesight has sorrowful, anxious,
Like She wanted to ask you,
You to entrust yourself to Her protection.

Madonna, Black Madonna,
How it is good to be Your child,
O, allow, Black Madonna,
To be hidden in Your arms.

In Her arms you will find peace
And you will be protected from evil,
Because for all Her children,
She has loving heart
And She will protect you,
When you give Her your heart,
When you will repeat these words:

Madonna, Black Madonna,
How it is good to be Your child,
O, allow, Black Madonna,
To be hidden in Your arms.

Today, when trouble is around of us,
Where a person can hide himself (herself),
Where a person should go,
If not to the Mother who will give consolation.
So, we are beseeching, o Madonna,
Direct eyesight on Your children
And hear, when we are singing, asking You:

Madonna, Black Madonna,
How it is good to be Your child,
O, allow, Black Madonna,
To be hidden in Your arms.

I have my own little Częstochowa in the rectory chapel, here in my house in Kiabakari. In December 1991, the former secretary of the Holy Father John Paul II, Mons. Stanisław Dziwisz, donated the copy of the image of Our Lady of Częstochowa to Kiabakari. It was a copy given to the Holy father himself, kept in Vatican stores for further disbursing. So, I gratefully took the image and brought to Kiabakari. First, I placed it in the back chapel of the shrine, dedicated to Our Lady of Perpetual Help.

But when eventually I was able to obtain a proper image of Our Lady of Perpetual Help for the chapel in the shrine a few years later, the image of Black Madonna found its final place in the house chapel. So, here it is, along with the picture of Jesus, the King of Mercy, in my house, called St. Robert Bellarmin House.

Our Lady, Black Madonna of Częstochowa, show us the way, guide us and protect us!