The year 2025 was a special time at Jasna Góra, both spiritually and organizationally. Celebrated throughout the Church as the Jubilee Year, proclaimed by Pope Francis in the bull Spes non confundit and lived under the motto “Pilgrims of Hope”, it set the rhythm of events at the Sanctuary and shaped the daily work of the Jasna Góra Information Centre.
“The Jubilee Year 2025 was for the Jasna Góra Information Centre a time of intensive service to pilgrims and an important moment of reflection on the history of our mission.”
For the Jasna Góra Information Centre, 2025 also marked the 30th anniversary of its establishment, celebrated jointly with Radio Jasna Góra. The jubilee was crowned by a solemn Thanksgiving Mass celebrated in the Chapel of Our Lady. During the same year, the Centre also acted as a co-organiser of the XXXX National Pilgrimage of Tourist Guides to Jasna Góra, which included retreats, lectures and common prayer.
The past year brought a clear and significant increase in the number of pilgrims and visitors using the Centre’s guiding services. In 2025, guides of the Jasna Góra Information Centre accompanied 102,314 pilgrims and tourists, forming 4,972 organised groups, and carried out more than 5,000 guided tours in total. Compared to the previous year, this represents an increase of nearly 15,000 visitors.
“Jasna Góra remains a meeting place for people from all over the world – in 2025 we guided groups from 78 different countries.”
During the pilgrimage season, standard sightseeing routes included, among others, the Museum of the 600th Anniversary, the Knights’ Hall and the Basilica, and—depending on the character of the group—either the Chapel of Our Lady or selected elements of the Jasna Góra fortifications. At the same time, the Centre continued to face conservation and organisational limitations.
“The military exhibition in St. Roch’s Bastion remains unavailable, and access to St. Barbara’s Bastion was limited throughout 2025.”
Despite these constraints, the Centre’s guides also led 159 groups in various languages through the historic Old Library of Jasna Góra.
Specialised thematic tours enjoyed considerable interest, especially among Polish groups seeking a deeper understanding of the Sanctuary’s spiritual and historical dimension. These included the Via Crucis route, the Fortalitium Marianum tour devoted to the history of the Jasna Góra fortress, and the Jasna Góra Crypts route, which offered guided access to the crypt beneath the Chapel of Our Lady and introduced visitors to places of memory preserved at the Sanctuary.
The year 2025 also provided interesting insights into the structure of pilgrim traffic. The largest number of groups came from Poland, with 2,111 groups and 46,917 participants. They were followed by pilgrims from the United States (1,014 groups and 18,221 participants), Germany (350 groups and 10,164 participants), as well as groups from Italy and Spain.
In terms of language, guided tours were most frequently conducted in Polish (2,309 groups), English (1,413 groups), German (453 groups), Spanish (359 groups) and Italian (331 groups).
“After the period of pandemic-related restrictions, the international character of pilgrimage movement to Jasna Góra is clearly returning.”
Throughout the year, the staff of the Jasna Góra Information Centre handled tour reservations, regularly updated the Centre’s website and ensured that the Sanctuary’s daily programme was displayed on LED information boards. Close cooperation continued with the Municipal Tourist Information Centre, Radio Jasna Góra and the Jasna Góra Press Office. A particularly noteworthy media project was the radio series ‘Jasna Góra for the Holidays’, prepared in cooperation with Polish Radio Katowice.
An important aspect of 2025 was also the ongoing formation and professional development of the Centre’s staff. In March, six employees of the Jasna Góra Information Centre completed a specialised course for guides of sacred sites, concluding with a formal examination. The Centre’s guides were also actively involved in preparing lectures for the National Pilgrimage of Tourist Guides.
Visits to the monastery complex were offered in ten languages, while pilgrims had access to information leaflets in fourteen language versions, as well as concise mini-guides in several of the most commonly used languages.
In 2025, the Director of the Jasna Góra Information Centre was Sr Małgorzata Kierznowska USJK, with overall supervision provided by the Prior of Jasna Góra, Fr Samuel Pacholski, OSPPE.
“The team of the Jasna Góra Information Centre gives thanks to God for a fruitful and blessed year of work and entrusts in prayer all pilgrims and visitors from Poland and around the world.”
The year 2025 closes as a time of growth, renewed international pilgrimage movement and intensive informational service. With hope and prayer for peace, the Jasna Góra Information Centre enters a new year of its mission.
