+ Today we celebrate the four apparitions (between December 9 to 12
in 1531) of the Blessed Virgin Mary to an Amerindian, Juan Diego, on
Tepeyac hill outside of Mexico City, ten years after the defeat of the Aztec
Empire at the hands of the Spanish conquerors. A painted, life-size figure of
the Virgin as a young, dark-skinned American Indian woman with the face of a
mestizo was imprinted on Juan Diego’s cloak. The image gave Indians the
assurance that Christianity was not only the faith of their European
conquerors, but a faith for them also; indeed, that Mary, the Mother of God, was
loving and compassionate toward them.
In 1754 Pope Benedict XIV
authorized a Mass and Office to be celebrated on December 12 in Mexico, under
the title of Our Lady of Guadalupe, and
he named Mary as patron saint of New Spain. She was designated patron saint of
all of Latin America in 1910, and as “Queen of Mexico and Empress of the
Americas” in 1945 by Pope Pius XII. Pope Benedict XVI declared this day a Holy
Day of Obligation in Mexico, and extended the feast to the universal church.
Today we celebrate the
simplicity and the faith of the woman who
was clothed with the sun, having the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve
stars: intercessor and friend and mother to all God’s children, including
most especially we remember this day, the poor and the lowly of Latin America.
Her greatness comes from her faith, her trust, her loving choices and her
self-sacrificial life-style: may we imitate her today, and invoke her aid both
for ourselves and our loved ones; and may we proclaim her greatness, not because
we are forced to, but because we want to, because we love her – who is seated
now beside the Great Intercessor Himself.
You
are the highest honor of our race – Holy Virgin Mary!
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