Wayside shrines - Lent 2023: Day 43

Easter Sunday is approaching rapidly, the weather is chilly for the time of year, but walking is a must. And walking around Gmina Chynów, I come across a large number of local wayside shrines, at least one per village. Not being affiliated to any parish, I don't know about their history - in particular whether the local church directed their erection, or whether local folk just decided to put one up, to what extent these were community initiatives or just the whim of individual householders or families. The inscriptions on the shrines generally have one common thread - they are supplications to the Blessed Virgin Mary, asking for good fortune, and to be spared misfortune.

Below: One of three shrines in the village of Staniszewice (pop. 81).

Below: the other two shrines in Staniszewice. Clearly, people have an urge to build these. 

On my walk today (11,900 paces), I passed five shrines - one in Jakubowizna, three in Widok (plus one large wooden cross) and one in Dąbrowa Duża. None particularly awe-inspiring (especially not on a cold and cloudy evening), but providing some comfort, some local frame of reference. A touchpoint to the Eternal? Or just a familiar element of everyday life?

Rural Mazowsze is full of such shrines, often on private land but facing the road, testament to the enduring power of faith among a population that still sows and reaps in time with the seasons. The supernatural determines droughts and late frosts, hail storms and pests. 

[If you are interested, have a look at this website which seeks to catalogue wayside shrines across Poland - only Małopolska province has more than Mazowsze]

O Traveller that passes by - spare but a thought for Providence; express gratitude for the bounties it may have conferred upon you.

We live our lives as pilgrims through space and time, relentlessly moving on; some of us just borne along by the stream, some of us fighting vainly against it, and some of us aware of what's going on and willing an optimal outcome. For me, these wayside shrines, largely lacking in aesthetic or metaphysical values (I find standing stones more powerful!) are reminders that we all live on the edge of chaos. Conscious supplications help steer that unthinking wave of misfortune - disease, tragic accidents, hunger, violence, as long as they are delivered in advance, with sincerity, and that gratitude be expressed when all ends well.

Lent 2022: Day 43

Spirit of Place and Metaphysics

Lent 2021: Day 43

Doubt and Curiosity

Lent 2020: Day 43

Quartodecimalism, or the fixing of the date of Easter