Marija Bistrica

The shrine at Marija Bistrica is built around a small carved wooden statue of the Virgin, dark with age, which according to the tradition recorded here was walled up twice during the Ottoman threat in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and found again both times. Pilgrimage grew from that, and the site is now the principal Marian shrine of the Croatian church, receiving several hundred thousand pilgrims a year, with a large open-air altar and an amphitheatre added for crowds. John Paul II came here in 1998 and beatified Cardinal Alojzije Stepinac at the site. The church itself was rebuilt in the nineteenth century by Hermann Bolle.

History

Bistrica is first recorded in 1209 as a possession of King Andrew II, and its church of Saints Peter and Paul in 1334. In 1545 the parish priest hid the wonder-working statue of the Virgin and Child, which had stood in a wooden chapel on the nearby Vinski Vrh, inside the church to keep it from the Ottomans; it was found again in 1588, the records say by a bright light shining from the place. It was hidden a second time in 1650 and rediscovered in 1684. The Croatian Parliament vowed a new altar in 1710, completed in 1715; the church was enlarged and reconsecrated to Our Lady of the Snows in 1731, and in 1750 Pope Benedict XIV granted an indulgence to pilgrims. Hermann Bollé built a new neo-Renaissance church in 1879-1882, with arcades painted with 22 scenes of miracles; a fire during the work destroyed everything but the statue and the main altar. Pius XI made the church a minor basilica in 1923, the statue was crowned Our Lady Queen of Croatia in 1935, and on 3 October 1998 Pope John Paul II beatified Cardinal Aloysius Stepinac here before a crowd of 500,000 (Wikipedia, Marija Bistrica).

What you'll find

• A dark wooden Madonna - walled up twice and rediscovered, by tradition.
• The main Croatian Marian shrine - hundreds of thousands of pilgrims a year.
• An outdoor altar and amphitheatre - built for the crowds.
• A papal visit in 1998 - the beatification of Cardinal Stepinac.

When to go

May to October, with the largest pilgrimage in July. Half a day.

Before you go

This is a working shrine and behaviour is expected to match; the biggest days are extremely crowded. The village around it is given over to devotional shops. Outside pilgrimage season it is quiet and plain.

Nearby

Zagorje's castles are around it; Zagreb is forty minutes south.