Word: madonna
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...when she auditions, he just looks at her until she blushes. He tells her to make her own decisions, to leave Snider--but in his eyes there is a feverish, ashamed glint that hides the familiar fantasies: Nicholas's difference is that he sees her as a Madonna instead of a whore. When she's with Aram she dresses better and drives a nicer car--but she's still an image that is only shattered when Snider destroys them both in a horribly protracted fit of self-annihilation...
While the bells of Poznan pealed and a full-voiced choir intoned a hymn, John Paul mounted the red-carpeted stairway leading to the altar and a gigantic reproduction of the icon of the Black Madonna. With the timing of a seasoned performer, he paused halfway to raise both arms in a gesture of blessing. Then the Pope joined 20 bishops in golden robes in a solemn ceremony beatifying Sister Urszula Ledochowska, a Polish educator who organized Catholic schools before World War I. As the Pope conferred on Sister Urszula the title "blessed," the next-to-last step...
...city's residents have remained firmly loyal to the church and, more recently, to Solidarity. Thus it was no surprise that John Paul waited until he had gone to Poland's industrial heartland to deliver his strongest sermon on the rights of workers. Standing under the Madonna of Piekary, an image of the Virgin Mary much revered by the region's coal miners, John Paul told his predominantly proletarian audience that work is "at the heart of all social life" and is governed "by a just moral order." He added: "If this order is missing, injustice takes...
...Poles, the Black Madonna of Czestochowa is far more than an object of Roman Catholic reverence. It is a source of historical continuity, a cause and remembrance of national liberation from foreign enemies, and a fount of miracles. The 4-ft. by 2½-ft. gilt-and-tempera dark-hued portrait of the Virgin Mary and Christ child is laden with gems and silver. By legend, the painting is attributed to St. Luke the Evangelist, and was executed on a table top from the house of Mary, Joseph and Jesus in Nazareth. It origins are unknown, but it may date...
...Madonna's status as an emblem of Polish nationalism dates from Sweden's invasion of the country in 1655. For 40 days, as the Swedes surrounded the monastery, the monks prayed to the Virgin for deliverance. The siege failed, and the Poles subsequently drove the Swedes out of the country. In gratitude, the reigning Polish monarch, Jan Kazimierz, dedicated his throne and the country to "the Virgin Mary, Queen of Poland." In 1711 the people of Warsaw walked to Czestochowa to thank the Virgin for saving the city from the bubonic plague. Ever since, the pilgrimage has been...