Our Lady of Guadalupe

WHILE WALKING FROM HIS VILLAGE to Mexico City in the early morning of December 9, 1531 (then the Feast of the Immaculate Conception in the Spanish Empire), peasant Juan Diego saw on the slopes of the Hill of Tepeyac a vision of a girl of fifteen or sixteen years of age, surrounded by light. Speaking to him in Nahuatl, the local language, she asked that a church be built at that site, in her honor; from her words, Juan Diego recognized the Lady as the Virgin Mary. Diego told his story to the Spanish Archbishop, Fray Juan de Zumárraga, who instructed him to return to Tepeyac Hill, and ask the lady for a miraculous sign to prove her identity. The first sign was the Virgin healing Juan's uncle. The Virgin told Juan Diego to gather flowers from the top of Tepeyac Hill. Although December was very late in the growing season for flowers to bloom, Juan Diego found at the usually barren hilltop Castilian roses, not native to Mexico, which he arranged in his peasant tilma cloak. When Juan Diego opened the cloak before Bishop Zumárraga on December 12, the flowers fell to the floor, and in their place was the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, miraculously imprinted on the fabric.

We see once again how Heaven chooses the most humble. What's interesting is in all of these huge apparitions Mary appears to the laity who have simplicity and humility. Juan Diego was a simple man of humble origin. Our Lady gave us this encouragement through him:

                                           "My little son. Do not be distressed and afraid. 
                                                  Am I not here who am your Mother?
                                            Are you not under my shadow and protection?
                                                     Am I not the fountain of your joy?
                             Are you not in the fold of my mantle, in the cradle of my arms?" 

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