An afternoon in the Eichsfeld

Day 2 of Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to the Federal Republic of Germany concluded with a sunset vigil of prayer at an iconic Marian Shrine that once stood behind the Iron Curtain. Veronica Scarsbrick is in Germany with the Pope and sends us this report:

A cross, cut from a section of a former barbed wire border fence. That was the symbolic gift Benedict XVI received on Friday afternoon at a Marian Shrine in Eichsfeld, a region 80 kilometres north of Erfurt.

The Pope was in this remote rural area in former Eastern Germany which until 1989 was behind the iron curtain visiting the Pilgrim’s Chapel the Wallfahrtskapelle at Etzselbach , a Marian shrine where people kept the faith alive during the harsh years of the communist regime and where as the Bishop of Erfurt diocese, Joachim Wanke remarked there were for decades mutually hostile models of society.

And when the Pope arrived here on Friday afternoon he himself remarked how: “during two godless dictatorships, which sought to deprive the people of their ancestral faith, the inhabitants here were in no doubt that in this shrine an open door and a place of inner peace was to be found.”

The Holy Father was here to pray together with the faithful, some 90.000 of them, some of whom no doubt personally witnessed that dark chapter in the history of Germany. To thank Mary, he said with you “here in the beloved quiet vale”, as the pilgrims’ hymn says, “under the old lime trees”, where Mary gives us security and new strength. And they came in great numbers, 90.000 of them and there was music.

The theme of Benedict XVI’s visit to his homeland , “Where God is, there is the future” seemed to take on a special meaning here. As Pope Benedict himself highlighted when he said: “when we allow God’s love to influence the whole of our lives, then heaven stands open.”

It was a prayerful moment as he presided over Marian vespers in the open air where nearby this elegant half timbered red neo- gothic chapel with an unusual ridge turret nestling in a remote and leafy wood.

A chapel built in 1801 and consecrated in 1898 , to replace a smaller more ancient one which like all Marian shrines has its popular beliefs . Among these the seeking of miraculous healing through the intercession of Our Lady of Sorrows , by wiping the face of a wooden statue depicting her dressed in blue red as she holds the lifeless body of her Son Christ in her arms. An image reproduced in the commemorative medal of this Apostolic journey to Germany.

In this shrine linked to a legend going back to the 16th century when it seems cart horses used to obstinately refused to move from this place where a statue of Our Lady was eventually discovered in the ground here.

No surprise then that among the four annual pilgrimage groups that make their way here each year, the most A cross, cut from a section of a former barbed wire border fence. That was the symbolic gift Benedict XVI received on Friday afternoon at a Marian Shrine in Eichsfeld, a region 80 kilometres north of Erfurt.

The Pope was in this remote rural area in former Eastern Germany which until 1989 was behind the iron curtain visiting the Pilgrim’s Chapel the Wallfahrtskapelle at Etzselbach , a Marian shrine where people kept the faith alive during the harsh years of the communist regime and where as the Bishop of Erfurt diocese, Joachim Wanke remarked there were for decades mutually hostile models of society.

And when the Pope arrived here on Friday afternoon he himself remarked how: “During two godless dictatorships, which sought to deprive the people of their ancestral faith, the inhabitants here were in no doubt that in this shrine an open door and a place of inner peace was to be found”.

The Holy Father was here to pray together with the faithful, some some of whom no doubt personally witnessed that dark chapter in the history of Germany. To thank Mary, he said with you “Here in the beloved quiet vale”, as the pilgrims’ hymn says, “under the old lime trees”, where Mary gives us security and new strength. And they came in great numbers, 90.000 of them and there was music.

The theme of Benedict XVI’s visit to his homeland , “Where God is, there is the future” seemed to take on a special meaning here. As Pope Benedict himself highlighted when he said: “when we allow God’s love to influence the whole of our lives, then heaven stands open.”

It was a prayerful moment as he presided over Marian vespers in the open air where nearby this elegant half timbered red neo- gothic chapel with an unusual ridge turret.

A chapel built in 1801 and consecrated in 1898 , to replace a smaller more ancient one which like all Marian shrines has its popular beliefs . Among these the seeking of miraculous healing through the intercession of Our Lady of Sorrows , by wiping the face of a wooden statue depicting her dressed in blue red as she holds the lifeless body of her Son Christ in her arms. An image reproduced in the commemorative medal of this Apostolic journey to Germany.

In this shrine linked to a legend going back to the 16th century when it seems cart horses used to obstinately refuse to move from this place where a statue of Our Lady was eventually discovered in the ground it’s no surprise then that among the four annual pilgrimage groups that make their way here each year, the most striking is one on horseback, the 'Pferdewallfahrt' . Hard to imagine hundreds of horses within the walls of the chapel awaiting their blessing .

When Benedict XVI left this place of pilgrimage the pilgrims stayed on some buying postcards welcoming the Pope to Etzselbach. Depicting him together with the miraculous statue of Our Lady of Wallfahrtskapelle and a map of Thuringia . Thuringia, in former Eastern Germany a place where as I said people kept the faith alive. Listen: