Today's Hours of Operation

Grounds: 9 a.m. - 5:30 p.m.

Gift Shop: 9 a.m. - 6:30 p.m.

Recitation of the Rosary

11:30 a.m.

Chapel of Mary

Daily Mass

12 noon

Chapel of Mary

Priest Office Hours

10-11:45 a.m. and

3-5 p.m.

Office is located inside the Visitor Center.

Your Sanctuary of Peace

As part of our Centennial celebration, we would like to share a piece of the sanctuary with you each day in April. We hope you will enjoy learning more about each feature, and find joy and peace by viewing the photographs.

Today: Lithuanian Wayside Shrine

About the Shrine

The shape of the shrine represents the tree of life, and the stylized branches are evergreens.

St. Casimir is a saint represented on the shrine. He was a king who was incredibly devout and overtly generous. He   is the only canonized saint and patron of the country.

The birds are important as Lithuania is the primary nesting area for more birds than any other country in Europe. The birds on the shrine announce the resurrection.

The Blessed Mother is represented throughout.

The Pensive Jesus

The Pensive Jesus or “the Brooding One” is located at the back of the shrine. As Christianity spread in the 16th century, the wandering woodcarvers of native folk culture carved him into hollowed-out tree trunks wherever they went. They put him at crossroads and in forests, and it’s a common thing to give as a token, or to be put at the corner of your land. It represents a God who identifies with the suffering of humanity.

The Day of Sorrow

Lithuanians relate the Pensive Jesus figure to their own passion as a people, especially since having endured persecution under the Soviet regime, including mass deportations to Siberian labor camps and other remote parts of the Soviet Union in the 1940s and ’50s.

About 60 percent of the roughly 130,000 Lithuanian deportees either died in the camps or were never able to return to their homeland - a tragedy still mourned by Lithuanians each year on June 14, the date of the first major deportation in 1941, known as the "Day of Sorrow."



Each year on June 14, the Lithuanian community gather at The Grotto to celebrate Mass and visit the shrine.

A Prayer at the Lithuanian Shrine

O Most Holy Mary,

As I pause at this shrine built by the faithful decades ago may I be reminded of your faithful witness; may I be challenged by your deep compassion, and may I be consoled by you in my sorrows.

I Pray that I grow as a person of faith, of hope and of charity, and that your guidance and example inspire me to commit myself more fervently as a living witness to your son Jesus.



Amen.

We hope you are enjoying the series "Your Sanctuary of Peace".

Tomorrow: St. Joseph's Grove