Today December 12

Today we celebrate a great saint -- and one of my favorite people -- the Virgin Mary. We celebrate her as she appeared to Juan Diego in 1531 under the title "Our Lady of Guadalupe" -- and we know exactly how she looked, because we have an exact image of her in the form of a miraculous painting on his poncho. And it's miraculous in many ways: from the roses gathered in it in December on a rocky hill where nothing grew, to the very fact of its existence now (long after it should have disintegrated), to the nature of its very art. I have an interest in art, so I was surprised and amazed to learn that the head and hands of our Lady were painted in oils, the rose-colored dress, angel and clouds in tempura, the blue-green mantle in watercolors and the background in fresco, almost unheard of (completely unheard of to me) in the BEST of circumstances but here it is all executed on sackcloth, a burlap-like material made of cactus fibers. Again I say it: amazing.

It was directly responsible -- well, it and Our Lady's influence and intercession with Almighty God, actually -- for the conversion of 8 million Mexicans. Its power was without words, but with its image itself. Our Lady stands in front of the sun, blocking it out -- the sun was one of the principle Aztec gods. She was standing on the moon, supplanting it -- the moon was another god. She wore a simple back cross around her neck, a cross much like the Franciscan missionaries carried, and that the conquistadors displayed on their banners (and that Montezuma's sister saw in a dream 10 years before they arrived). The white fur at her neck and sleeves and the golden stars on her mantle showed she was royalty. The angel holding her aloft showed she was a heavenly being. The hands clasped in prayer showed there was One greater than she. All this from a picture!

And she is pregnant. I think this condition is partially why she is the patroness of the unborn -- and a symbol of the gentle and relentless fight to save them from death. She is also patroness of all the Americas -- so she is ours also. But there is a special place for her in Mexican hearts. As Pope Benedict XIV said: "God has not done likewise to any other nation." Blessed Virgin of Guadalupe, pray for us.