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Our Lady of Guadalupe Appeared Before a Poor Mexican Peasant So This New World Would  Know Her Son Came For All

 By Eileen Dugan
The Sooner Catholic

A new Christian convert, 55-year old Cuauhtlatohuac, was hurrying down Tepeyac Hill to hear Mass in Mexico City on Saturday, December 9, 1531. Juan Diego was his Christian name. Suddenly, the Blessed Virgin appeared to him with the olive skin of an indigenous Mexican, not the white skin of a European. She did not speak to him in Spanish, but in his native Nahuatl language. She sent Juan Diego to Bishop Juan de Zumarraga to request that the bishop build a church in her honor at the site of her appearance.

Diego hurried to the bishop to relay Mary’s request, but the bishop did not believe him. He sent Juan Diego back to the hill to bring back “a sign of the lady who said she was the mother of the true God”.

As Diego left the bishop’s residence to get a sign from the lady, he learned his uncle Bernardino was extremely ill. Juan Diego had no choice but to attend to him. By dawn on Tuesday, December 12, Bernardino was at the point of death, and Diego ran to Saint James’s convent to get a priest to administer the last rites. On the way, Mary met him and asked him where he was going. As Diego explained about his uncle’s illness, Mary assured him that Bernardino had been healed, a fact later verified. She identified herself as Holy Mary of Guadalupe and again asked Diego to go to the bishop and ask that a church be built where she had at first appeared.

Diego told Mary he would gladly return to the bishop but that the bishop wanted a sign which would prove who she was. Mary instructed Diego to climb to the top of Tepeyac Hill and use his tilma to gather the roses he would find there. A tilma is a cloak made from coarse cactus cloth and worn by poor Mexican natives.

The Indian knew it was not the right the time of year for roses, too cold, and that the top of the hill was too rocky for roses to grow. But, in obedience to Holy Mary, Diego climbed to the top of Tepeyac. There he found the crown of the hill covered with fragrant roses which he gathered in his tilma. He returned with them to Mary.

She helped him rearrange the roses in his tilma and told him to go immediately to the bishop and show the roses to him. As Diego emptied the roses at the bishop’s feet, the bishop fell to his knees. There, on Diego’s cloak, was the life-sized imprint of the Virgin’s image, just as she had appeared to him.

“The picture was venerated, guarded in the bishop’s chapel, and carried processionally to the preliminary shrine,” built on the spot the Blessed Virgin had chosen. Eventually, a great church was constructed there. For almost 500 years, pilgrims have flocked to the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the site of many miracles.

Juan Diego was declared a saint by Pope John Paul II on July 31, 2003. His feast day is December 9. His tilma bearing Our Lady’s portrait has survived for 474 years, without decay; a cactus-cloth tilma usually lasts about 20 years.