Mužić Josip: Gospa i Hrvati: pučka pobožnost, vjera Božjih ugodnika i čuda

Josip Mužić: Our Lady and the Croats: popular piety, the faith of God's delights and miracles

Marian piety is one of the main components of Croatian Catholic identity. That Marian piety among Croats is often connected with the survival of the nation itself is evidenced by the many Croatian shrines erected as a sign of gratitude to Our Lady.
This will be confirmed by the reading before you, which is somewhat demanding because it abounds in many data, notes and references, as well as the necessary theological analysis. Although the text on such a topic could be written in any other way, I did not want to leave out the scientific approach, even though it required additional effort. Namely, Marian piety not only of ordinary believers but also of God's pleasing ones, is easily belittled and declared as a story and legend if it is not supported by additional evidence. This disparagement is disastrous and very dangerous because it turns out that our devotion to Our Lady rests for the most part on fabrications and lies. Such that a prudent believer cannot accept. However, there are many good believers who, willy-nilly, believe that it is only a matter of made-up stories, and because of this they are ashamed of Marian piety, suppress it, and sometimes even outright separate themselves from it. Thus the new generations are deprived of the graces received, being left to fend for themselves like orphans who have yet to find their mother. It is an unnatural and dangerous path on which many lose their faith.
This book should be approached as a kind of spiritual reading that can help in establishing and building a personal relationship with Our Lady: the more we know her, the more we will love her. The content of the book is mostly focused on the relationship of the Croatian people to Our Lady, because it is a component of the Croatian Catholic identity that was often suppressed during our thirteen-century history, and there are such attempts even today. The abundance of testimonies from Croatia's past can be an incentive and empowerment for the readers of this book to deal with the new challenges of the 21st century independently, and not without pride. Of course, the book is equally intended for everyone else who wants to learn about Our Lady's work in the history of their people and thus discover their Christian roots in order to bear fruit through them in their time and their homeland.

Josip Mužić (from the Preface)