🇭🇺✝️🇻🇦🇷🇴 Hundreds of thousands of Roman-Catholic Hungarians and Szeklers gathered at Șumuleu Ciuc (Csíksomlyo) as part of a yearly pilgrimage for the Pentecost.

The pilgrimage gathers yearly between 250-300k Hungarians from all over the world, with many high-ranking Hungarian politicians present usually. They gather and pray jointly at a statue of the Virgin Mary whom they consider as being capable of making wonders.

Legend has it that this particular statue saved the Catholic community in Szekler seats of Ciuc (Csíkszek) Gheorgheni (Gyergyószék) and Cașin (Kászonszék) in 1567 from the armies of the unitarian princeps of Transylvania, John II Sigismund Zápolya, who, started as a Roman-Catholic but converted to Lutheranism in 1562 then to Calvinism in 1564 and then to Unitarianism in 1568. John tried to convert the Szeklers to his Unitarian religion but he was met with stiff resistance not only from the Szeklers but other Hungarian nobles, the Lutheran Saxons and Orthodox Romanians which resulted in the 1568 Edict of Turda emitted by the Transylvanian Diet which proclaimed religious freedom and tolerance for the nations of Transylvania.

Video and photo: Szilard Peter, Facebook

@Wallachian_Gazette