Father Józef Tischner in Gorce

Father Józef Tischner was born in 1931 in Stary Sącz, and when he was a few years old, his family moved to Łopuszna. And it was this place that he always considered his home. He repeatedly said that it was the mountains that shaped his religious views and horizons.

When the war reached the area, he and his family fled to the mountains, to the foot of Turbacz.

After graduating from secondary school, he studied law at the Jagiellonian University, and in 1950 he entered the seminary. After becoming a PhD in 1963, he began the work of a teacher there. He celebrated his first mass in the very close to his heart historic church of the Holy Trinity in Łopuszna.

The mountains, and Gorce above all, were always close to Father Tischner’s heart. In the mid-70s, he built a mountain shelter in the Sumolowa clearing between Łopuszna and Turbacz, which is known today as "Tischnerówka", where he went in his spare time.

In 1981, he became the chaplain of the Association of the Podhalans, and in the same year, thanks to him, the first mass in the intention of the Homeland was celebrated in the Papal Chapel on Turbacz. As long as his health allowed him to, he always came to the chapel on foot, from Łopuszna, wearing traditional highland clothes and a hat with an eagle feather, to celebrate the Feast of the Mountain People there.

The sermons preached at the solemn Masses to the highlanders contained simple truths about human dignity, and their vocation to be free and love.

After death, he was laid to rest in the cemetery in Łopuszna, remaining forever in his beloved mountains; in the shelter on Turbacz, a plaque dedicated to his memory was placed.