Anecdotes about the Virgin Mary

The spring of the runaway monk of Zarvanytsia

Zarvanytsia (Ukraine) (1240)

In the region of Ternopil, in western Ukraine, is one of the great Marian shrines of the country and the most loved by the Greek-Ukrainian Catholics: Zarvanytsiawith his Mother of God of Ternure. Its origin dates back, according to tradition, to 1240in the horror of the Mongolian invasion that destroyed Kiev.

The story - transmitted as a pious legend, not a document of the 13th century - tells that a Anonymous monk He fled from destroyed Kiev and walked west about five hundred kilometres. Wounded and exhausted, he reached a spring near the Strypa River. He drank, washed his wounds and fell asleep. In his dreams he saw the Virgin Mary with the Child Jesus over the source. When he woke up, he found at his side an icon that represented that same scene; and when he washed again, he discovered that his wounds were completely healed. Grateful, he raised a chapel by the spring and remained there in prayer.

Las fuentes actuales hablan explícitamente de «leyenda» o «tradición»: no consta documentación medieval directa sobre el monje ni sobre el primer icono. Lo que sí está documentado es lo moderno: Zarvanytsia como gran santuario nacional greco-católico, con su iglesia principal consagrada en el año 2000 y elevada a lower basilica on 30 June 2019. En el domingo próximo al 17 de julio se reúnen cerca de cien mil peregrinos en un pueblo de unos trescientos habitantes, en la peregrinación nacional. Aleteia lo ha llamado «la Lourdes de Ucrania», por su fuente y las curaciones asociadas.

En los años recientes, Zarvanytsia se ha vuelto lugar de acogida de refugiados y de oración por la paz, un verdadero «santuario de esperanza». La piedad se expresa según el rito bizantino —veneración del icono, akáthistos, paráklesis—; las fuentes consultadas no mencionan a specific tradition of the Latin Rosary linked to the sanctuary, although its intense Marian prayer, also linked to the consecration of Ukraine to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.