What an amazing event!

Thousands of people from across Poland traveled to their country’s border Saturday (October 7th), forming a human chain around the country, and prayed the Rosary “to save Poland and the world.”

“The rosary is a powerful weapon in the fight against evil,” the official website for the event explains. “Therefore, we believe that if the rosary is prayed by about a million Poles on the borders of the country, it may not only change the course of events, but open hearts of our compatriots to the grace of God.”

Organized by Catholic laypeople of the Solo Dios Basta (“God Alone Suffices”) Foundation, the event was sponsored by various state-owned companies and was approved by the Polish Catholic hierarchy.

A spokesman for the Polish Bishops’ Conference, Rev. Paweł Rytel-Andrianik, told the New York Times that, while he did not yet have precise figures on the number of participants, he believed the event was one of the largest prayer events ever in Europe, second only to the 2016 World Youth Day which was also in Poland.

The official website gave a number of reasons why it made sense to have the prayer event on Saturday, including:

(1) It was the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, which commemorates the Christian victory over Muslim forces in the Battle of Lepanto;

(2) It was the first Saturday of the month, and there’s a First Saturdays devotion give by the Blessed Virgin Mary to Sr. Lucia of Fatima;

(3) This year is the 140th anniversary of the apparition of Our Lady in Gietrzwald, a famous apparition in Poland;

(4) This year is the 100th anniversary of the apparition of Our Lady of Fatima;

“Through this unprecedented prayer of the Rosary,” the 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.”

In his homily at Mass Saturday morning, Archbishop Marek Jedraszewski of Krakow exhorted the faithful to “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.”

The event also got an endorsement from Polish Prime Minister Beata Szydło on Twitter:

Translated to English, her tweet reads, “I greet all the participants,” and the hashtag translates to “rosary on the borders.” As of this writing, the tweet had been retweeted over 800 times and liked over 3400 times.

Here is an amateur video of part of the chain:

What do you think of the event? Let us know in the comments!

[See also: When the Rosary Saved Christendom: The Extraordinary Miracle of Lepanto]

[See also: The 15 Promises of the Virgin Mary For Those Who Pray the Holy Rosary]

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