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Browsing Tag: Poland

Poland’s Buried Treasure: The Grandeur of the Wieliczka Salt Mines

The Wieliczka Salt Mines. A thousand feet deep, 200 miles of passageways first dug with hand tools by salt miners beginning in the 13th century when salt was precious as silver. Magnificent carvings in grey salt rocks. Chandeliers carved from salt crystals. There are over twenty separate chapels in the mine dating from the 17th century. I expected the salt to be white, but it varies from all shades of …

Walking Among the Ghosts of Auschwitz-Birkenau

This is a difficult post to write. It should be. The inconceivable horrors that took place here, and in over 450 other concentration camps in Poland alone, are memorialized on a scale equal to the evil of their complex, messianic perpetrators. The people of Poland and the Baltic countries do not doubt that this evil still governs. Putin’s armies patrol their borders. NATO membership is cherished. It is estimated that …

The Mysterious and Miraculous Black Madonna of Czestochowa

Easter Sunday just outside of Krakow in Europe’s most Catholic country. This most important holiday is a celebration of food, family and worship. No shops are open and even the picnic tables at the monastery of Jasna Gora have been removed. Bells peal from the towers as we enter the small sanctuary where the Madonna is housed. Mass is being said but we have received permission to pass through to …