The Blessed Virgin shares the sorrows of her people

In 1696, the village of Pócs (renamed Máriapócs), Hungary, prayed for the release of 8-year-old Ladislas Csigri, the son of peasants, who had been kidnapped by the Turks. The prayers were answered and in thanksgiving, his parents commissioned an icon of the Virgin for the village church.

That same year, on November 4th, this icon wept tears of blood, showing her concern for the country under Turkish occupation. This prodigy continued for 18 days, from the end of November to the beginning of December 1696, visible to all the local faithful and visitors from the whole region.

After the story reached Vienna, the capital, Emperor Leopold asked for the transfer of the miraculous icon to the imperial city, which gave it a triumphant reception at the beginning of the year 1697. Crowds of the faithful came to pray before the painting that had wept, believing that the Mother of God shared the sorrows of her people.

Prince Eugene of Savoy (d.1736), a great military leader who was then leading the Austrian armies, also came to ask the assistance of the Virgin against threatening Muslim armies. He attributed his victories to Our Lady. The Church investigation in which more than fifty witnesses testified under oath, gives strong credence to this story.

The village of Máriapócs received a copy of the original icon, and that copy again shed tears in 1715. Since then, this Marian shrine has attracted large crowds. In 1991, Pope Saint John Paul II celebrated Mass in Máriapócs in the presence of 200,000 people.

Adapted from Notre-Dame des Temps Nouveaux, 1967

Reprinted in Collection of Marian Stories by Brother Albert Pfleger of the same year