Elementy maryjnej duchowości Ormian obrządku katolickiego w Polsce

Abstract

An analysis of the titles given to the temples of the Catholic Armenian Church in Poland shows that devotion to the Mother of God, shaping the Marian spirituality of the faithful in the Armenian Church, is as old as the one in the Church of the Latin tradition in Poland. Initially, it developed simultaneously and independently of any influence of Polish piety. It existed before the union with the Apostolic See was accepted, a fact testified by material traces of the devotion to the Mother of God in the temples built and equipped in the pre-union period (e.g. the church dedicated to the Mother of God in Lvov in 1351, or in Jazłowiec in 1551). In the later period churches were most often dedicated to the Immaculate Conception of Our Lady – in Brzeżany, Horodenka, Kuty, Raszków, and Stanisławów. Similarly, the Assumption churches were built by Armenians in Kamieniec Podolski (irretrievably demolished in 1672), in Lvov, in Łysiec, Śniatyń, and in Zamość; moreover, the churches were dedicated to the Visitation of Our Lady (in Mohylew) and the Annunciation in Kamieniec Podolski. The inter-war period made the Polish Churches – Catholic Armenian and Roman Catholic – come closer through common preparations for the coronation in 1937 of the miraculous icon of the Gracious Mother of God in Stanisławów. A similar process is repeated in the most recent history in the pre-coronation period in 1989 (the Mother of God of Łysiec in Gliwice). One cannot speak, however, about a mutual influence of any of the Churches, rather about the universal character of the Marian spirituality of Christians.