Mary Queen of Peace, Patroness of Kazakhstan (II)

In the 1980s, the faithful of the Almaty diocese, in Kazakhstan were still without a priest. They began to build a church near Oziorno—a town whose name means “of the lake.” When a priest was sent there (he is the current bishop of Nurslutan, formerly Astania, the capital of the country) the church was completed, with the help of a benefactor who asked that it be dedicated to “Mary, Queen of Peace.”

In 1995, the then-bishop of Kazakhstan and Central Asia consecrated the entire region to the Virgin Mary, Queen of Peace, in a period “of great poverty and very explosive social tensions.” The local bishop pointed out how interesting it is that it was “from then on that Kazakhstan lifted up its head.” This explains why Mary, Queen of Peace, is the Patroness of Kazakhstan.

When Saint John Paul II came to the country in 2001, he spoke at the National Shrine of Oziorno … And so the National Shrine of Mary Queen of Peace was inaugurated in this small town in the Diocese of Nursultan. Pope John Paul II evoked the origin of the name Oziorno and its meaning: "This lake," he stated, "is a reminder that God’s mercy continues at every moment—Jesus, through his Mother, gives us all the graces, all the fish. In the painting (1), there are seven fish, a number that symbolizes entirety," he concluded.

1. See A Moment with Mary of June 3, 2019

Adapted from Vatican News