Lednica Fields

For most of the year the Lednica Fields are quiet meadows above Lake Lednica, with a white steel fish on the hill. Once a year, on the first Saturday of June, up to 100,000 young people gather here for the Lednica 2000 Youth Meeting – one of the largest religious gatherings in Poland. Since 1 January 2013 the fields have been a separate part of the village of Imiołki in Kiszkowo district, near the road from Poznań to Gniezno.

History: from one meeting to a movement

The first meeting took place in 1997, on the eve of Pope John Paul II's pilgrimage to Gniezno. It was the idea of Father Jan Góra, a Dominican from Poznań. The location is no accident: across the lake lies Ostrów Lednicki, which some accounts name as the place of Poland's baptism. According to reports from that year, the pope flew over the fields by helicopter on his way from Gorzów to Gniezno, stopped above the gate, blessed the crowd and was the first to pass through it – from the air.

Since 2005 the meetings have been held on the first Saturday of June; the 30th was scheduled for 6 June 2026. In 2025, with around 21,000 participants, the organisers ordered an evacuation because of storms – a first in the event's history. Father Góra died suddenly on 21 December 2015 in Poznań. His coffin was carried through the Fish Gate, and he was buried on the fields beside the rock of St John Paul II.

What to see

• The Fish Gate (Gate of the Third Millennium) – an openwork steel structure measuring 36 × 9 m, built in 1997 and approached by a processional path lined with boulders marking the Stations of the Cross.
• The bell tower with the “Jesus Christ” bell – the bell weighs 1.2 tonnes, was cast in Przemyśl and consecrated on 10 June 2000. It hangs in a 9-tonne openwork frame with a cage shaped like a globe.
• The John Paul II boulder – a block of rock of about 25 tonnes from the Konin coal mine, put up in April 2006.
• Father Jan Góra's grave by the papal rock.
• The John Paul II House – a centre with a chapel and a museum of papal mementoes: a cassock, shoes, a walking stick, a skullcap and a cast of his hand, and since 2012 a copy of the font from Wadowice.

Did you know?

The bell's consecration in 2000 was unusual: Primate Józef Glemp blessed it from the basket of a fire-engine ladder, lifted to the height where it hangs. The fields also host smaller events – Lednica for Seniors, Lednica for Families with a night in tents beneath the Fish, and Lednica for Motorcyclists, when riders pass through the gate on their bikes.

Tripto tip

The site is open and the fields are free to enter; on the days of large meetings the organisers' rules apply, and access and parking are arranged differently. A walk from the gate past the bell tower to Father Góra's grave takes 45–60 minutes. The Dominicans who live on site celebrate Mass on weekdays and Saturdays at 19:00 (April–September) or 18:00 (October–March), and on Sundays at 11:00, followed by coffee in their café. The centre's address is Pola Lednickie 1, 62-265 Imiołki. Ostrów Lednicki with the Museum of the First Piasts is a separate attraction with its own tickets – the two combine well in one day.