Catholic Voice

 The history of the Aztec people, who were the indigenous peoples of Central America and Mexico, is terrifying. Upwards of 50,000 people were offered up yearly, as human sacrifices to appease the false gods, and in particular the sun god. Most of the victims were children, who were handed over up by their parents to be sacrificed on top of high altars, usually up on the Mayan Pyramids. They had their hearts ripped out and their blood drank, or spilled over the altars. These primitive people were not yet evangelized and bore all the hallmarks of true paganism and its brutal effects. While Europe was reaching the heights of the Renaissance movement with its culture of beauty and perfection, Mexico was totally pagan and its culture revolved around death and idolatry.

 

In the year 1474, a male child was born in Cuautitlan; he was an Aztec Indian, and he was called Quauhtlatoatzin. He grew up with his family and established strong bonds with them, especially with his uncle. During this time, Spain was beginning to colonize Mexico and Central America, and by 1521, Hernando Cortez, the famous Spanish Conquistador, had defeated and conquered the Aztec Empire. He executed the Aztec Emperor Montezuma in Tenochtitlan, which is now called Mexico City. Once the Aztec armies were subdued, Cortez went about making peace with the Indian people and began to develop the agricultural and mining areas of Mexico, exploiting its gold and silver. While this was happening, many of the Indians were being educated in new schools which were being built, and many were being converted and baptised by the Franciscan missionaries, including one called Quauhtlatoatzin, who took a Christian name: he was called Juan Diego.

Juan Diego was a small farmer, who grew just about enough to keep himself and his wife, Maria Lucia, alive, but he was also a weaver of sleeping mats. They had no children but were close to the two families of each other. He was pretty much aware of what was happening and how the Aztec era was coming to an end, and a more civilized one was taking shape with the arrival of the Spanish and with them a large group of Franciscans, 12 in all, who preached day and night about the Kingdom of God.

 

In 1648 a book was published called “Imagen de la Virgen Maria, Madre de Dios de Guadalupe.” The author was a Father Miguel Sanchez who was a priest of the Archdiocese of Mexico City. Here in great detail and working from the archives of the Archdiocese, Fr. Sanchez put together the entire account of the life of Juan Diego, and the apparitions of Our Lady to him.

According to these accounts, Juan Diego and Maria Lucia, having heard a sermon during Mass given by the same priest who baptised them, called Father Peter da Gand O.F.M., on the virtue of chastity, decided to live chaste lives themselves, even though they were married (we are all called to live chaste lives, even in marriage). This decision was later cited as a possible reason why the Virgin Mary chose to appear to Juan Diego. In 1529, a few years after her baptism, Maria Lucia became sick and eventually died. According to Father Sánchez’ account, Juan Diego and his wife had lived chastely their entire lives, and after Maria Lucia’s death, Juan Diego vowed to continue to live a life of purity. Juan Diego was also a very humble and gentle man who cared much for his friends and family.

Juan Diego was very proud of his new found faith in the Catholic Church, and delighted in going to and from the local church as often as he could, and especially if there was mass being celebrated. Then other times he would go to the small church to pray, and here he developed a great devotion to the holy rosary, which the Franciscans, who had brought this devotion from Spain, had taught him.

Juan Diego did not have many clothes and the few items he had were for working in. The clothes would have been made from coarse materials, and he would have been lucky to have had any cotton or wool. When outdoors, if it was cold, he would wear a cloak made from cactus fibers and this was called a “Tilma.” One such morning, it was a Saturday, the 9^th of December 1531, he set off to walk to the church, thinking about his worries and what, and whom he should pray for.

As he walked up the Tepeyac hill he heard someone’s beautiful voice calling his name, several times. He ran up the hill to see who it was, and there he saw a beautiful and radiant Lady, whom he recalls was about fourteen or fifteen years of age. “She resembed an Aztec Princess in appearance, and was surrounded by a golden light,” he said. The Lady spoke to him in Nahuatl, his native tongue. She called him “Xocoyte,” her little son. He responded by calling her “Xocoyote,” a name given to the youngest child of a family, an endearing title. The Lady asked Juan Diego to go and tell the Bishop of Mexico City, a Franciscan by the name of Juan de Zumárraga O.F.M., that she wanted a “teocalli,” a “chapel,” to be built in her honour, on the spot where she stood.

In telling Juan Diego who She was, She said “Know for certain, dearest of my sons, that I am the perfect and perpetual Virgin Mary, Mother of the True God, through which everything lives, the Lord of all things, near and far, the Master of Heaven and Earth.

The Virgin Mary also told Juan Diego what She wanted and what She would do “I wish and intensely desire that in this place my sanctuary be erected. Here I will demonstrate, I will exhibit, I will give all my love, my compassion, my help and my protection to the people. I am your merciful mother, the merciful mother of all of you, who live united in this land, and of all mankind, of all those who love me, of those who cry to me, of those who seek me, of those who have confidence in me. Here I will hear their weeping, their sorrow and will remedy and alleviate all their multiple sufferings, necessities and misfortunes.”

Juan Diego knew that he now had a mission, and that he was to be Our Lady’s special messenger; he did not yet know why, but just that he was. He also knew that he must now make haste and go to the bishop as directed.

 

Upon arrival at the Bishop’s house, the servants did not want to let him in, he was not dressed up, he was not groomed to see such an important personage as the Bishop. However his insistance won out and he was eventually brought in and told to wait.

 

Bishop Juan de Zumarraga duly arrived and asked what was this all about. Juan Diego explained all that had happened to him and how this beautiful, radiant Lady appeared to him and told him that She was the Mother of God. Further that She said that She was the Mother of all humanity and that She had asked him to go to the Bishop and to tell him of Her desires. The Bishop had difficulty taking in this story and wondered where it might have come from. He realised however the gentleness, piety and humility of this man, so instead of throwing him out, he asked him to ask the Lady for a sign, and given the sign, he would do all She asked of him.

 

Juan Diego returned to Tepeyac immediately and told the Virgin what had happened, stating that the Bishop wanted a sign, though he did not say what kind of sign. He also asked that, if possible, the Virgin might choose a more suitable messenger, one more worthy than himself, to bring such an important message to His Lordship, the Bishop. The Virgin insisted however that he was the one who should bring Her message to the Bishop and that this message was of the utmost importance.

 

Juan Diego went again to the Bishop on Sunday, but again the Bishop insisted on a sign from this beautiful Lady, before he could believe the story. Juan felt sad that the Bishop did not believe him, but went back to report to Our Lady at Tepeyac, and this time She promised him that a sign would be given the following day.

 

He returned home later and found his uncle Juan Bernadino quite ill, and in need of urgent medical attention. As the night went on, Juan Diego realised that his uncle was dying, and as soon as daybreak came, he was going to get one of the Franciscan priests to give his uncle the last rites. He set off at the crack of dawn, but decided not to go near Tepeyac hill in case he met Our Lady again, because he felt that She would send him back to the Bishop, especially now that his focus was on his sick uncle.

 

However, as he crept around the Hill, Our Lady called him “Juanito” (little John) and “Juan Dieguito,” (“the most humble of my sons,” and “my son the least.”). He went up, in obedience to the call, to the top of the hill and there, to his amazement, the beautiful Lady was waiting for him and also around Her were beautiful red roses in full bloom in December. Our Lady assured him there and then that his uncle would not die, and in fact at that moment he was cured, and was working in the garden, at home. (She had appeared to Juan Bernadino and cured him immediately).

 

Our Lady then asked Juan Diego to pick the roses, so, very carefully, using his small knive, he cut them one by one.Our Lady then arranged them in his “tilma” and told him to bring these to his Lordship the Bishop.

 

Upon arriving, the servants did not want to see Juan Diego, but he insisted again that he must see Bishop Zumárraga. The Bishop did come down to meet Juan Diego but he was not happy to see him and asked “what do you want now?” Juan Diego told him that the Lady had told him to pick some roses which were in bloom on top of the Tepeyac hill and to bring them to him, and that She herself even arranged them in his tilma, and that he was not to open this tilma until he saw the Bishop personally.

 

The Bishop then demanded to see these roses, and Juan Diego unfolded his tilma in front of the Bishop. Roses cascaded down to the ground from the tilma, and an icon of Our Lady of Guadalupe was miraculously impressed on the cloth, bringing the Bishop to his knees. The Bishop cried and called all of his household together to behold the wonder, the sign that he had asked for was now in front of him. “It’s true,” he exclaimed, “it’s true that Our Lady has appeared to you with a message for me.” Juan Diego had not realised then that there was an image in his tilma until he removed it. Upon looking at it he declared, “yes that is the Lady who asked me to visit with you, who also cured my uncle.” The Bishop ordered an immediate investigation to study the tilma, the story of Juan Diego, and the roses. Close inspection of the beautiful red roses proved that they must have come from Castilla in Spain, where the Bishop came from, but not from Mexico and especially not from Tepeyac where nothing grew. The Bishop also conceded that he had prayed for a sign himself, in case the story were true, and that he had asked Our Lady to send him roses from his home town in Castilla in Spain.

 

It was not understood how the image got on the tilma either, save that of a true miracle, as it was not painted or imprinted and it was in colour; it seemed to float on the tilma. The miracle of it continues to this day. Here on this tilma was a life sized image of Our Lady, “the perfect, and perpetual Virgin Mary,” the “Immaculate Conception,” as She would declare in Lourdes some 327 years later to Saint Bernadette Soubirous. Also, it is worth noting that the medal that Our Lady asked to be printed in Paris in 1830, through Saint Catherine Laboure, also states “O Mary Conceived Without Sin, Pray For Us Who Have Recourse To Thee.” There is no doubt about the Perfection of Our Lady, after all She is the most perfect of all of God’s creations.

 

The Dogma of the Immaculate Conception was declared by Blessed Pope Pius IX on the 8^th of December 1854 in the Constitution “Ineffabilis Deus.” However, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception  was already established as a Universal Feast of the Roman Catholic Church in 1476 by Pope Sixtus IV, that is 165 years before the apparitions in Lourdes, and Our Lady confirms it personally, down through the ages, in the many apparitions which have been approved by the Church.

 

The tilma still has the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, and there has been no decay or discolouring of the image despite the poor conditions it was kept in until recently. It has not come to any harm, despite the dangers from smoke, candles, incense and humidity. Historically two events did put the image in danger, one was an ammonia spill in 1791 which damaged the image, but it “repaired itself” and secondly in 1921 an anarchist placed an offering of flowers in a vase next to the image. Inside the vase was a bomb which exploded, but did no damage to the tilma.

 

Looking closely at the image, there are several important features; firstly the “body language.” Here the Virgin shows Herself in prayer holding her hands joined as She depicts an intense love for humanity. She is looking downwards towards those who are looking up at Her and possesses a “motherly expression” of care and concern. Her head is slightly tilted to the right, which is a pose often depicted by those who are humble and gentle. The pupils of Her eyes are visible, and within them a speck of light that until recently held a guarded secret. Her eyes actually worked as mirrors and have captivated ophtalmologists for years.

 

The first official photographer was Signor Alfonso Marcue who in 1929 claimed that he could clearly see an image of a bearded man in the left eye of the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe. In 1951 Signor Jose Carlos Salinas Chavez confirmed that claim and hence unknowingly opened the door to a worldwide interest into research of the “eyes of Our Lady.” In 1979 Dr. Jose Aste Tonsmann of Cornell University in New York was able to take a close up, high resolution photo of the image and magnified it 100,000 times and what he discovered was stunning. The image was not only of Juan Diego, but of others in a scene where Juan Diego is seen along with Bishop Zumarraga and a translator and others, and it depicts Juan Diego showing his tilma to the bishop in the instant that the image appeared on the tilma.

 

Other experts look at the miraculous image of Our Lady, the only “authentic image” of Her that we have. They note every minute detail, for example the stars on Her mantle depict the same array of stars seen in the Mexican skies on the night of December 12^th every year. The colour of the mantle is the exact same colour worn by the Aztec Empress, before that empire ended. The black cross and brooch around the neck of Our Lady of Guadalupe is a sign of the true Church and is the cross of Christ. The black belt around Her waist is an Aztec maternity belt and She is with Child. The design on Her rose coloured garment is also a contour map of Mexico which tells the Aztec Indians where they will find her.

 

The image has consistently defied exact reproduction, whether by brush or the most sophisticated camera, and continues to baffle the experts, and cannot be explained by science. In fact His Holiness Pope Pius XII stated in 1945 that the “Virgin of Guadalupe and Queen of Mexico, and Empress of the Americas, had been painted with brushes that were not of this world.”

 

In the immediate aftermath of the apparitions and as news of the tilma spread, some 9 million indians were baptised and all human sacrifice ended in Mexico. An incredible list of cures,interventions and miracles are attributed to Our Lady on a daily basis, many of these are physical, most are spiritual. The impact of this image is extraordinary and attracts some 20 million pilgrims per year, making it Christianity’s most visited Shrine. Altogether some 25 popes have honoured the Shrine and image of Our Lady of Guadalupe, beginning with Pope Benedict XIV when he exclaimed that “She has done more for Mexico than to any other nation.” In 1754 the same Pope approved a special mass and divine office for celebration every year on the Feast day, December 12^th. Pope Saint Pius X declared Our Lady of Guadalupe “Patroness of the Americas.” This was extended in 1935 to the Philippines by Pope Pius XI. Pope John XIII addressed Her as Mother and Teacher of the Faith to the peoples of the Americas. Pope Paul VI also venerated Her and sent a “Golden Rose” in 1966. It was Pope John Paul II however who visited the Shrine no less than four times in 1979, 1990, 1999 and 2002. In the 1979 visit the Pope called Her the “Star of Evangelization” and in 1990 declared Juan Diego Blessed. Finally Pope John Paul II canonised Juan Diego in 2002 in the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe on the 31^st of July. During the same visit, Pope John Paul II entrusted the cause of Life to Her loving protection and placed under Her Motherly care the innocent lives of children and especially those who are in danger of not being born.

 

The miraculous image of Our Lady in Guadalupe is said to be the best representation of the “Immaculate Conception” that exists. The origin of the name Guadalupe is a corruption of a Nahuatl, Aztec name “Coatlaxopeuh” which means “She who crushes the Serpent.” She is Mother of all humanity and should be invoked and venerated by all.

 

Saint Juan Diego was 57 years old when he first saw Our Lady. After the apparitions he received permission from Bishop Juan de Zumarraga to live in a room attached to the newly built chapel that was the home of the Image of Our Lady. He gave his house and lands to his uncle and he spent the rest of his life as a hermit in prayer and contemplation. He died on May 30^th 1548 at the age of 74. The Feast day of Saint Juan Diego (Quauhtlatoatzin) is celebrated by the Universal Church on December 9^th, a day after the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, and three days before the Church celebrates Our Lady of Guadalupe on December 12^th. The nearest international airport is Mexico City, for those who would like to visit and the website is www.virgendeguadalupe.org.mx.

This feature is categorised under Marian Shrines