From: pharvey@quack.sac.ca.us (Paul Harvey)
Subject: Cath Christianity 101 - Dec 12 Our Lady of Guadalupe(Mexico) Feast Day
Organization: The Duck Pond public unix: +1 408 249 9630, log in as 'guest'.
Date: 13 Dec 1992 06:59:55 UTC

I found this in talk.religion.misc, it's long (~700 lines) but an OK write up
of what is probably the myth of modern Mestizo Mexico, as it combines both 
pre-Christian and Christian religions into one, more or less. It's interesting
to speculate on the origin of this myth. Was it fabricated by the
Franciscans as a means to increase Indio conversion to Christianity or
was it fabricated by the Indios as a way to introduce some of the
indigenous myth into Mexican Catholicism or - did it really happen?

In article <1gdeojINN283@agate.berkeley.edu> 
dzkriz@ocf.berkeley.edu (Dennis Kriz) writes:
>Today, Dec. 12th, is the feast day of Our Lady of Guadalupe.  It is
>difficult to imagine how one could hope to understand Mexico without
>knowing of Our Lady of Guadalupe, for the reported apparitions of
>Mary outside Mexico City in 1531 absolutely changed that country
>forever.  Yet it is doubtful that the average non-Catholic North
>American gringo will ever find mention of these reported events in
>his or her classes, even simply as an aid toward understanding the
>Mexican cultural reality.  Protestant or secularist, the United
>States has never known quite how do deal with Our Lady of Guadalupe. 
>And thus most U.S. citizens live with a phenomenal gap with regard to
>understanding their southern neighbor.  
>
>In Christ,
>
>dennis
>dzkriz@lightning.berkeley.edu
>--------------------------------------------------------------------- 
>   
>from "A Woman Clothed in the Sun" edited by John J. Delaney (Image
>Books: New York 1961, Nihil Obstat James F. Rigney, STD, Censor
>Librorum; Imprimatur Francis Cardinal Spellman, Archbishop of New
>York, Nov. 4, 1959).
>
>
>                        OUR LADY OF GUADALUPE
>                         by Ethyl Cook Eliot
>
>  It happened on the arid top of a 130 foot hillock in wasteland five
>miles north of Mexico City, then confined to its original island in a
>lake.  The date was Saturday, Dec. 9, 1531; the hour daybreak.  Only
>one person witnessed it, however, and his account of the prodigy --
>until it was verified, four days later -- was not believed.  
>
>  It happened to a poor-as-poverty Aztec Indian.  Born into the
>servant caste fifty-seven years earlier and given the Nahuatl name
>Singing Eagle, he had survived in obscurity the Spanish conquest of
>1519-21.  Until the truth of his strange tale had been sealed with a
>visible, durable sign, he had been of no account to anyone in this
>world except his no-account friends and family.  When he did become
>of immense account to millions, almost overnight (and without the
>benefit of radio or television), his wife had been dead for several
>years and they had no children.  His one remaining relative was an
>uncle -- an uncle who had been his foster father since his early
>childhood.  Uncle and nephew had been among the first Indians to be
>converted to Christianity by the Franciscan missionaries, who
>baptized them with the names they had gone by for the past seven
>years -- Juan Bernardino and Juan Diego.
>
>  Juan Diego was devoted to his uncle, but the relationship was by
>this time turned about: Juan Diego was watching over the old man with
>as much care as he had received from him fifty years earlier.  They
>lived near each other, but alone, in Tolpetlac, a village of one-room
>houses thatched with cornstalks.  In spite of the task of growing
>corn and beans for them both, and hiring himself out for any other
>labor he could get, Juan Diego managed to see his uncle and be of
>help to him at some time every day.  But this Saturday, December 9,
>was unprecedented.  Juan Bernardino had no sight of his nephew all
>that day.
>
>  Juan Diego had left the village before daybreak in order to be in
>time to hear the Mass celebrated in Our Lady's honor (as the
>Franciscans then did on Saturdays) at the church of Santiago in the
>village of Tlaltelolco.  It was a long run over the hills, and the
>Fathers stressed the importance of never coming to a Mass late, and
>called the roll of their converts before beginning.  Running through
>the high, rare air in the hardy Indian manner, he would have arrived
>at the same hour as any other morning if he hadn't been halted in his
>tracks by what he took for the burst of bird song.  This as unheard-
>of, at this time of year, with everything so bleak and cold. Even at
>the appropriate season, Juan had never before heard birds welcome the
>dawn with an abrupt burst into song all together.  The music was
>thrillingly sharp, and thrillingly sweet.  As it went on, Juan's ear
>discerned what seemed a harmony among separate choirs of song birds
>scattered over the scrubby sides of a little hill that his path
>skirted.  On this hill, Tepeyac, had formerly stood a temple to the
>Mother-goddess of the Aztecs.  Now it was desert.
>
>  Quite soon the shrill caroling stopped as suddenly as it had begun,
>with no lingering twitters.  Such a silence with no breath of warning
>unnerved Juan.  He didn't resume running.  He stood listening to the
>silence, straining for some sound, any sound to break the spell.  It
>came almost at once, but it was as astounding in that place and at
>that time as the bird music had been.  A woman was calling down to
>him from the ruinous rocks at the top of Tepeyac hill.  Though day
>had broken, Juan couldn't see her.  A frosty mist, a brightening
>cloud hid the rocks and the woman was calling.  She was calling him
>by name, and urgently: "Juan! Juan Diego! Juanito! Juan Dieguito!"
>
>  Whoever she was, he must go up to her and find out what she wanted
>of him.  It was a short climb to the top, but he got no sight of her
>until he reached the rocks, and then he saw her more completely than
>he had ever seen anything else in his life.  He saw what he looked
>at, whole and at the same time in the minutest detail.
>
>  The sun wasn't above the horizon, yet Juan saw her as if against
>the sun because of the golden beams that rayed her person from head
>to feet.  She was a young Mexican girl about fourteen years old and
>wonderfully beautiful.  Her garments were wonderfully beautiful.  The
>rocks and dry grasses and stunted thorn trees were wonderfully
>beautiful, as if her splendor radiated onto them.  The cactus leaves
>gleamed like emeralds, and their spines like gold.  Each plant, each
>stone was sharply etched by Juan's vision, transparent and jewel-like
>in color.  But Juan was not dazzled by the radiance before him and
>all around him.  It was just the opposite.  He saw it all with
>heightened powers of vision, and when the girl finally spoke, he
>heard with the same heightened power of hearing every most delicate
>inflection and emphasis of his mother tongue. "Nopiltzin, campa
>tiauh?"
>
>  The girls said: "Juan, the smallest and dearest of my little
>children, where were you going?"
>
>  Juan said: "My lady and my child, I was hurrying to Tlaltelolco to
>see the Mass and hear the Gospel explained" (The use of "child" and
>the other dimunitives used by Juan at later meetings, appear in the
>oldest account.  Probably Aztecs of Juan's servant caste habitually
>used them toward their superiors; but one may also remember that the
>Virgin looked young enough to be Juan's grand-daughter).
>
>  The girl said: "Dear little son, I love you.  I want you to know
>who I am.  I am the ever-virgin Mary, Mother of the true God who
>gives life and maintains it in existence.  He created all things.  He
>is in all places.  He is lord of heaven and earth.  I desire a
>teocali (temple or church) at this place where I will show my
>compassion to your people and to all people who sincerely ask my help
>in their work and in their sorrows.  Here, I will see their tears; I
>will console them and they will be at east.  So run now to
>Tenochtitlan (Mexico City) and tell the Lord Bishop all that you have
>seen and heard."
>
>  Juan had fallen to his knees when the Virgin told him who she was.
>Now he prostrated himself at her feet and replied, "Noble Lady, I
>will do what you ask of me!"  Then he quickly rose and took a
>courteous and humble leave of her.
>
>  This was no light service.  If anyone else, no matter how exalted a
>person, had directed Juan Diego to take a message to the Bishop in
>the city and deliver it to him personally, Juan would have made every
>excuse possible to get out of it.  The five-mile run to the city was
>no great matter.  He was fifty-seven years old and fasting since
>yesterday's sunset, but his body was agile and toughened from early
>childhood.  Indians of Juans' low degree, however, seldom went into
>Mexico City, and Juan had never had the temerity to do so, even
>before the Spanish conquest.  The Spaniards in Tlaltelolco were
>different. Even the Indians who held fast to their forefathers'
>beliefs -- and these were still the vast majority -- didn't think of
>the Franciscan missionaries as their conquerors.  They and their
>converts together had built the church there and a school and a many-
>roomed house for themselves.  TO even the humblest, they seemed
>fellow men -- poor, roughly clothed in brown tunics, hard-working,
>meagerly fed, and serenely gentle.  So Juan felt as easy in
>Tlaltelolco as he did in Tolpetlac.  But Tenochtitlan!And even if the
>Spanish hidalgos and soldiers he would run into there didn't set
>their dogs on him or beat him, how was he to find his way to the
>Bishop's house?  He was badly frightened.
>
>  However much trouble Juan may have gone through before he arrived
>at the door of the palace, he did manage it, was admitted inside, and
>after some rough treatment from the servants that just fell short of
>injury to his person, and being kept waiting in a corner for a very
>long time, he found himself at last in the episcopal presence.
>  The Bishop-elect (not yet consecrated) was Don Fray Juan de
>Zumarraga, a Franciscan who, in Spain, having distributed a royal
>gift to his community among poor laymen, thus winning the king's
>notice and the papal appointment.  In Mexico since 1528, he had
>greatly softened the conquerors' harshness to the Indians.  It was
>not he who had kept Juan waiting all those hours; he had only now
>been told that a lowly native from the country was there with a
>message for his ear alone, and would let no one else relay it.
>
>  The Lord Bishop was courteous and kind in his reception of Juan
>Diego. (It is hardly probably that the Aztec could speak enough
>Spanish to convey Our Lady's message, but the Bishop kept an
>interpreter, Juan Gonzalez, who had come to Mexico with Cortez,
>presently became a missionary, and in 1534 a priest.)  Listening to
>the story, the Bishop was impressed by the Indian's humility and
>seeming sincerity.  He asked Juan a few questions -- where he lived,
>his occupation, his knowledge of the Gospels, his religious practices
>-- and found Juan's responses satisfactory.  But the story of the
>encounter and dialogue with the Queen of Heaven, and how she desired
>a church built in that uninhabited place -- he shook his head.  He
>ended the interview by saying he would think it over.  Juan could
>come again, if he cared to, and they would talk further about it.
>
>  The sun was almost set when Juan came back to the hill where he had
>heard the strange bird choirs and see the radiant little Virgin.
>Tired and very hungry as he must have been by this time, he swerved
>from the path and climbed to the spot.  Though he had sadly failed
>the Mother of God in the matter of her new temple, holy ground was
>holy ground.  He must do it reverence.
>
>  When he reached the top, the Blessed Virgin was there, waiting for
>him as if it had been arranged between them.  Juan knelt down.  He
>said: "My dearest child, my Lady and Queen, I did your errand.  I
>told the Bishop all that I had seen and heard here.  He listened, and
>asked many questions; but I could see he did not believe that
>everything was just as I said it was.  He thought I could be mistaken
>about your wanting a church in this waste place, and even about who
>it was I had seen and spoken with here.  He gave me kind permission
>to visit him again, but I fear I should get no further.  I am not
>worthy of your trusting me with a message so important.  Please send
>someone more suitable; for I am a nobody ... Forgive my boldness in
>advising you."
>
>  The Blessed Virgin said: "Listen, little son.  There are many I
>could send.  But you are the one I have chosen for this task.  So,
>tomorrow morning, go back to the Bishop.  Tell him it is the Virgin
>Mary who sends you, and repeat to him my great desire for a church in
>this place."
>
>  Juan said: "I will do so willingly though I fear the Bishop may not
>be pleased to see me back so soon.  And if he is pleased, he still
>may not believe that it was really you who sent me.  But I am your
>servant and will obey your every wish.  Tomorrow I will return here
>to tell you how my second try comes out.  So, youngest of my
>daughters, Noble Lady, rest yourself until then."
>
>  The next morning, Sunday, Juan rose in the dark and got to the
>church in Tlaltelolco in time for Mass.  Directly after Mass was
>over, he went on into Mexico City to confront the Bishop a second
>time.  The palace servants had perhaps been rebuked, for they let him
>in with almost no ado, and one of them went promptly off to announce
>him.
>
>  Fray Juan de Zumarraga was astonished and possibly annoyed.  It was
>true he had told the visionary Indian to come again, if he wished, at
>some later date, but that he was here the very next day and so early
>in the morning -- that seemed hysterical or, at the least, childish.
>Busy as he was, however, the Bishop received him with outward
>patience and listened to his tale of a second meeting with the
>Blessed Virgin, up where the rocks were, on little Tepeyac.
>
>  Juan related how, much to his surprise, the Queen of angels and men
>had waited all yesterday in that lonely place to learn what the
>Bishop meant to do about the church she wanted built there.  But when
>he, poor Juan Diego, had the boldness to inform her that the Bishop
>seemed uncertain it was she herself who had sent the message, she had
>not shown dismay.  She had simply said that Juan should return this
>morning and assure the Bishop it *was* she herself -- the ever-Virgin
>-- and that she *did* desire a building in that place.
>
>  The Bishop was thoughtful.  He was beginning almost to believe that
>this simple Indian might not be deluded.  But there are visions and
>visions; some heavenly, some not, no matter how much they assume the
>disguise of holiness.  he no longer wondered whether this earnest
>convert had perhaps made up the story for vanity's sake or to gain
>something practical for himself, such as having a church built nearer
>to his own village for his better convenience in getting to Mass.
>Even with ulterior motives for fabricating his meetings with Nuestra
>Senora, this poor Indian was far to simple for so impressive a
>performance.  Moreover, everything about the story was so
>circumstantial!  No matter how closely the man was questioned or
>asked to repeat any part of description or dialogue, he never
>contradicted himself.  Rather, it seemed as if the questions brought
>to his mind such trivial points as he would not think of inventing. 
>Still, there was nothing, as yet, that Bishop Zumarraga could act on. 
>Some proof that Juan, however truthful, was not suffering deception
>or delusion, was indispensable -- but what sort of proof?
>
>  In the end the Bishop rather tentatively suggested that Juan might
>ask Santa Maria for a sign that would prove it was truly herself.
>Juan was going right back to her on the little hill ...? Very well --
>  Nut before dismissing Juan, the Bishop left the room for a few
>moments to instruct two of his most trusted servants to follow the
>Indian home.  They were to keep far enough behind him not to let him
>realize he was being followed; to notice very carefully any persons
>he stopped to speak with; and to watch him until he reached his
>village, no matter how far away that was.
>
>  These two servants returned with their report much sooner than the
>Bishop had expect them.  The distressing thing was that the Indian
>had outwitted them, or that was the excuse they offered.  Passing
>through the city, he spoke to no one nor did anyone so much as greet
>him. Outside the city, he quickened his pace, but they kept him in
>sight. He was on the road ahead of them until he reached the foot of
>a little hill about five miles out.  At that point he simply
>vanished.  They searched the whole vicinity, but he was too cleverly
>hidden; they couldn't find him.
>
>  But Juan had not outwitted anyone, nor been clever at hiding.  He
>had not been aware that he was under surveillance.  He could see the
>top of the Virgin's hill.  He could be seen from it.  That was his
>goal, and his only thought the thought of who was watching for him
>there among the rocks.
>
>  Again Juan knelt at the feet of holy Mary and told her how the
>Bishop had asked for a sign.  This did not discompose her; in fact,
>she was pleased.  She said: "Very well, little son.  Come back
>tomorrow at daybreak.  I will give you a sign for him.  You have
>taken much trouble on my account, and I shall reward you for it.  Go
>in peace, and rest."
>
>  But the next thing was for Juan to visit his uncle, Juan to visit
>his uncle, and it was well he did.  The old man had been stricken
>with *cocolistle*, a contagious and deadly fever that Juan recognized
>only too well.  He gathered herbs and prepared medicines.  He kept up
>his own strength with food.  Through that night and day and night
>following, he did everything humanly possible to relieve Juan
>Bernardino's sufferings.  He did not keep his appointment with the
>Virgin that Monday morning, but gave precedence to his uncle's need.
>
>  Sometime before daybreak on Tuesday, Juan Bernardino took a turn
>for the worse.  He felt certain that he would not live to see the sun
>set that day, and begged his nephew to run to Tlaltelolco and return
>with a priest.  The only service Juan could render him now, and the
>last one in this world, was to arrange that he should not die without
>receiving the Last Sacraments.  No matter how lonely and uncared-for
>Juan left his dear foster father this duty came first for them both. 
>
>
>  This time on his run to Tlaltelolco, Juan chose to go round the
>east side of Tepeyac hill.  It was on the west side that the Blessed
>Virgin had first seen him and called him up to her.  If she were
>there now she would see him again, for the day was just breaking. 
>She might call him again.  This would mean delay, when every moment
>was precious.
>
>  But it didn't work.  He was hardly started on the eastern path when
>he saw her descending Tepeyac at an angle that would intercept him
>just beyond the next curve.  He couldn't go back.  She must have seen
>him, and would be astonished if he were so discourteous as to avoid
>the meeting.  He did not slow his pace until he was near enough to
>kneel at her feet.
>  She said: "Least of my sons, what is the matter?"
>
>  And as if to make light of his embarrassment, he answered at first:
>"My dear child, my Lady!  Why are you up so early?  Are you well?"
>But then (and how breathless the words must have sounded), "Forgive
>me! My uncles is dying of *cocolistle* and desires me to fetch a
>priest to give him the Last Sacraments.  It was no heedless promise I
>made to meet you yesterday morning and take the Bishop the sign you
>intended to send him.  But my uncle fell ill."
>
>  The Blessed Virgin said: "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?  Your uncle will not die at this time.  This
>very moment his health is restored.  Thee is no reason now for the
>errand you set out on, and you can peacefully attend to mine.  Go up
>to the top of the hill; cut the flowers that are growing there and
>bring them to me."
>
>  No flowers could be in bloom on the frozen hill.  Nor could Juan's
>uncle be healed of his wasting sickness and be, all in one moment,
>perfectly well.  But Juan did not question the Blessed Virgin's
>words. Nor was it blind faith that made him believe.  He was seeing
>her, hearing her voice.
>
>  Castilian roses -- exotic, impossible -- were growing on the
>hilltop.  Juan noticed as he cut them that their petals were drenched
>with dew, not rimmed with frost as the scrub and mesquite were.  The
>best way to protect them against the cold was to cradle them in his
>*tilma* -- a regular Aztec garment like a long cape worn in front,
>and often looped up as a carryall.  Not to tire the Blessed Virgin
>with further waiting, Juan worked quickly, filling his tilma with the
>fresh fragrant blossoms.  Then he ran down and bending low before
>her, held out the slightly opened wrap for her to see that this time,
>anyway, he had been successful in fulfilling her desire.  But he had
>dropped the flowers helter-skelter into the fold, and the Virgin was
>not satisfied.  With her own holy hands, she rearranged them
>carefully, taking thought over every rose as to just how it should
>lie.  Then she tied the low corners of his tilma behind his neck, so
>that nothing could spill.
>
>  When she was done she said, "You see, little son, this is the sign
>I am sending to the Bishop.  Tell him that now he has his sign, he
>should build the temple I desire in this place.  Do not let anyone
>but him see what you are carrying.  Hold both sides until you are in
>his presence and have already told him how I intercepted you on your
>way to fetch a priest to give the Last Sacraments to your uncle, how
>I assured you he was perfectly healed, and sent you up to cut these
>roses, and myself arranged them like this.  Remember, little son,
>that you are my trusted ambassador, and this time the Bishop will
>believe all that you tell him."
>
>  As far as is known, this is the last time here on earth that Juan
>Diego ever saw the Virgin or heard her voice.
>
>  All the way to the Bishop's palace Juan delighted in the perfume of
>the roses.  He held his tilma tightly closed, but their fragrance
>penetrated the coarse weave and scented the winter air he ran
>through. The palace servants when Juan gained admittance were
>astonished by the sweet odor that entered along with the beggarly
>Indian.  They traced it to what he was so craftily hiding from them
>in his uncouth apron. When Juan refused to let them see, or tell them
>anything, they jostled and strated him in hope to loosen his grip
>enough for a glimpse.  They succeeded, but could hardly believe their
>eyes.  Some snatched at the flowers, but each time arose rose was
>touched it no longer seemed real but rather an embroidery or painting
>on the cream colored cloth.  Word of the commotion soon reached the
>Bishop, and Juan was fetched away to his apartment.
>
>  This time several of the Bishop's household were present.  Perhaps
>he had summoned them to give their various opinions of this vision-
>seeing Indian.
>
>  Juan unhaltingly advanced and stood before the episcopal chair.
>Lest he loose his clutch on the sides of his tilma, he dared not
>kneel down as courtesy demanded.  So he stood all the minutes it took
>to tell what the Blessed Virgin had urgently requested he should tell
>and in the right order.  He added nothing and left out nothing. 
>Sentence by sentence, Juan Gonzalez interpreted.  Then Juan Diego put
>up both hands and untied the corners of crude cloth behind his neck. 
>The looped-up fold of the tilma fell; the flowers he thought were the
>precious sign tumbled out and lay in an untidy heap on the floor.
>Alas for the Virgin's careful arrangement.
>
>  But Juan's confusion over this mishap was nothing to what he felt
>immediately after it.  Inside of seconds the Bishop had risen from
>his chair and was kneeling at Juan's feet, and inside of a minute all
>the other persons in the room had surged forward and were also
>kneeling.  Juan would have thought they were praying except that he
>himself seemed the object of their rapt gazes.  But no, it was his
>tilma, that now hung down to his ankles.
>
>  No wonder the Bishop and his household were kneeling before the
>length of primitive cloth.  Millions of people have knelt before it
>since, in awe and gratitude as profound as theirs who saw it first.
>The miracle of the roses were sign enough of the authenticity of the
>Indian's visions, but the Blessed Virgin had trusted him with an even
>more wonderful sign.  What she had imprinted on his vision and memory
>at the time of the first apparition, now -- three days later -- was
>imaged in glorious beauty on the front of his tilma.
>
>  However long the Bishop and the others with him knelt in reverent
>awe before this first showing of the miraculous picture, the moment
>came when he rose, gently untied the tilma of the astounded Indian,
>lifted it from him and carried it with all reverence into his private
>chapel.  There, after it was appropriately attached to a wall near
>the altar, Juan himself could kneel with the others in prolonged and
>prayerful wonder.
>
>  Juan was willing to remain in the palace for the rest of that day
>and the night following.  He had no anxiety about his uncle's health,
>and the Bishop requested his continued presence.  Meanwhile, the news
>spread.  Early Wednesday morning Juan's humble tilma, glorified with
>the supernatural image imprinted on it, was carried in solemn and
>joyous procession to the cathedral, where everyone in the city
>thronged to see it and pray before it. 
>
>  The next thing was for Juan to show the Bishop and those he asked
>to accompany them to the sacred hill where the Blessed Virgin desired
>a church to be built.  After viewing the holy ground -- bleak now and
>with no traces of the glory that had so recently blessed it -- the
>Bishop gave Juan permission to return to his village.  He himself
>would waste no time about constructing at least a shrine on Tepeyac,
>but some in his company could go with the Indian to see how his uncle
>fared, and if he was well enough they were to bring him back with
>Juan to Mexico City.
>
>  Juan Bernardino was sunning himself at his door when his nephew
>arrived, and was astonished by his escort of friars and caballeros.
>He wasn't in custody; he was showing them the way.  Rapidly the
>villagers were closing in around them, forgetting timidity in their
>eagerness to see and hear Juan Diego's amazement at finding his uncle
>alive and well.  All yesterday they had looked for his return with a
>priest.  By last night they felt sure he had himself come down with
>the dread cocolistle.  Now today he appeared with a whole troop of
>Fathers and hidalgos!
>
>  Encircled by the fascinated audience, uncle and nephew were
>embracing.  Juan Diego was eager to give his uncle the joyous
>explanation of his long absence, but in courtesy he first inquired
>how he felt now; and the old man had his own marvels of yesterday
>morning to relate.  Too weak to even drink the concoction of herbs
>his nephew had left at his side, he longed for daylight and spiritual
>comfort, yet had no hope of living until either could arrive. 
>Darkness encompassed him, when of a sudden the room was filled with
>soft light. A luminous young woman, all made of peace and love, stood
>beside him. She told him he would get well, and he believed her.  She
>told him she had intercepted his nephew and sent him to the Bishop
>with a picture of herself to be enshrined at Tepeyac.  She further
>told him, "Call me and call my image Santa Maria de Guadalupe."  Then
>she disappeared and dawn stole in.
>
>  (Now Guadalupe -- the "river of the wolf" in Saracenic Spain -- had
>given its name to a little statue of Madonna and Child which a
>cowherd found buried near it, toward the end of the thirteenth
>century when the Moors had been expelled from Eastremadura.  King
>Alfonso XI enshrined it in a chapel.  Columbus prayed there before
>his voyage and named one of the Antilles he discovered "Guadalupe." 
>TO the Spaniards in Mexico the name seemed natural.  Applying it to
>the Indian Virgin made them feel at home in New Spain.  But to the
>natives it could have no appeal.  They could not even pronounce it,
>for neither G nor D (nor R) was used in Nahuatl.  "Santa Malia," as
>they pronounced Maria, was familiar to them, especially to converts
>like Juan Bernardino, but instead of "de Guadalupe" some other, more
>intelligible, syllable must have been spoken to him by the
>Apparition.  Recent research, especially that of Helen Behrens,
>strongly suggests that these were tetcuatazopeuh, which repeated by
>Juan Bernardino to the Spaniards were heard as "de Guatlashupe,"
>easily assimilated by their ears to the Old World title.  Of course
>they supposed the old Indian was doing his best to say "de
>Guadalupe"!  But to all Aztec ears the compound epithet meant Stone
>Serpent Troddenon: the Apparition had announced that she had
>suppressed and supplanted Quetzalcoatl, the terrible god (originally
>perhaps a comet later the planet nearest earth) idolized as a
>feathered serpent to whom countless men had been excruciatingly
>sacrificed.  What wonder that as the word spread among the Indians of
>*this* title given to herself by the vision of Juan Bernardino *and*
>the promise made by the identical vision to Juan Diego ("I will give
>my motherly love and compassion to all who seek my aid"), plus the
>actual picture in which they could read many concurrent symbols --
>clouds, sun, stars, crescent, and the little black cross on a golden
>brooch -- the natives swarmed to embrace the Christian religion in
>which one divine man had been sacrificed once and for all.  The
>Mother of their God had come to them directly and told them in their
>own tongue that she had trodden on the serpent's head.
>
>  In the seven years 1532-1538, EIGHT MILLION (emphasis of author,
>not the poster) natives were baptized.  Friar Toribio de Benevente
>recorded that in five days, 14,500 presented themselves at his
>mission and were anointed with oil and chrism.  Learning of the
>sacrament of matrimony, 1000 couples were married in one day.  For
>Easter, 1540, twelve different tribes peacefully assembled ad one
>church, some from as far away as 150 miles.  Today over five million
>people come annually to Guadalupe, and the descendants of the Aztecs,
>dancing, hail "Teotl Inzntzin" (God's Mother) by her title,
>"Coatlalupej," and sing how "She freed us from the great evil, She
>crushed the serpent!")
>
>  This, to Juan Bernardino, was the fifth apparition of our Holy
>Mother on the American continent -- a delicate kindness shown to her
>Juanito's foster father.  Through him she made known to Spaniard and
>to Aztec the significant name by which her image was to unify them in
>Christendom.
>
>  Juan Bernardino got up and went about his chores serene and well.
>Not until this morning had he begun to worry over his nephew's long
>absence.  What, now, had kept him, and why were all these white men
>so respectful?  Never had he seen such a novelty -- not in his
>lifetime. It nearly overwhelmed him when he was placed upon a litter,
>and four young men of Tolpetlac were hired to bear him to the
>Bishop's palace. To the City in the Lake! For a fortnight's visit!
>
>  Swiftly news of the church to be built in the precinct of the
>Mother-goddess on Tepeyac was carried from village to village.  The
>Indian's own church, requested through one of themselves!  Volunteer
>laborers appeared more than could be employed.  In only thirteen days
>the simple chapel-like structure was completed.  On the day after
>Christmas the sacred Image was brought to it in great procession and
>installed above the altar; the church was blessed and the Mass
>celebrated. 
>  Here ends the earliest account (c. 1560) of the miracles written in
>Nahuatl by an Aztec of the former imperial family who was educated at
>Tlaltelolco and attained very high office under the name of Don
>Antonio Valeriano (died 1605).  But recently there came to light a
>much older, actually contemporary document that had lain among the
>Archives of the Indies in Seville, Spain.  This is a letter to the
>conqueror Cortes, written by Bishop Zumarraga on Christmas Eve, 1531. 
>It presupposes Cortes' acquaintance with the recent events and is not
>explicit, but is imbued with exaltation.
>
>     "I have had the news published -- sent a messenger to
>     Cuernavaca -- an Indian to Fray Toribio -- am preparing the
>     festival and keeping with me a little longer your honor's
>     trumpeters.  How glorious it will be!  The joy of all is
>     indescribable.  Tell my lady the Marquesa [Cortes' wife]
>     that eventually I want to dedicate my cathedral to the
>     Immaculate Conception because it was during that feast
>     [December 8-17 in the missal used in Mexico] that God and
>     his Blessed Mother deigned to shower the land you won with
>     this great favor.  No more now."  -- The Bishop Elect,
>     filled with joy.
>
> Cortes and his marquesa took part in the procession.  Everybody
>walked in it.  But the Indians danced too, and one in his frenzy was
>grievously wounded by an arrowhead piercing his neck.  Unconscious,
>he was laid before the Image, and amid fervent prayers a friar
>staunched his wound.  His eyes opened.  He beheld the Image.  He
>revived.  He lived.  And the Aztec hymns rose louder than before. 
>"The chiefs sing to thee, Santa Maria, the people dance before thee. 
>Speak, Father Bishop, to us thy children, newborn beside the lake."
>
>  While the millions of baptisms were taking place, Juan Diego spent
>his days in a hermitage built for him beside the little chapel on the
>holy hill.  To pilgrims he showed the sacred picture and repeated the
>story.  At a time when the laity was not accustomed to frequent
>communion, he, by special order of the Bishop, received his Savior
>three times a week.  When he died in 1548, his room, appropriately,
>became the baptistry of "the old church of the Indians,": and on one
>wall of it a tablet proclaimed, "In this place Our Lady of Guadalupe
>appeared to an Indian named Juan Diego who is buried in this church." 
>Juan Bernardino, too, was reverenced, and after he died in 1544 his
>hut in Tolpetlac became a chapel that still stands, in good repair. 
>In 1545 a cruel pestilence abated when the small children of the
>countryside were brought together before the Virgin's picture and
>appealed to her.
>
>  Not quite a century after the miracles of 1531, Mexico City was
>badly flooded during four years of unusual rain.  In a convent there
>an Indian lay sister had a vision of the Virgin as portrayed on the
>*tilma*, propping up the threatened walls.  Accordingly, the
>Archbishop with a rich flotilla of boats, lights, and music fetched
>the precious Image from Tepeyac to its "birthplace" in his palace and
>kept it in the capital till the floods subsided.  In 1663, it left
>the original shrine for a stately, towered temple built for it close
>by, where it was kept locked in a silver tabernacle and behind
>curtains expect during Mass or when responsible persons were present. 
>Only forty-six years later (1709) it was installed in its present
>place, around which a complex of buildings grew.  Eventually, in
>1904, the great domed church was declared a basilica; and since its
>interior was done over in 1931 it has been considered the most
>beautiful church in the Western Hemisphere.
>
>  Above the high altar is Juan Diego's *tilma* still intact.  Two
>straight pieces, coarsely woven of fiber from the maguey plant, are
>sewn together so that the whole measures 66 inches by 41 inches.  In
>color it looks rather like unbleached linen.  Modern scientists are
>agreed that in the Mexican climate this cloth would naturally have
>disintegrated beyond recognition within twenty years.  On its
>fishnet-like web no painting could ever have been done; and even on a
>properly prepared canvas, the picture would within two hundred years
>have been browned over to the point of obliteration.  What colors,
>what gilt were employed is still a mystery.  The technique has eluded
>and still eludes all endeavors to elucidate it.
>
>  The figure is only 56 inches tall, but as one draws back from it,
>it seems to become larger and more plastic.  Surrounded by golden
>rays, it emerges as from a shell of light, clear-cut and lovely in
>every detail of line and color.  The head is bent slightly and very
>gracefully to the right, just avoiding the long seam.  The eyes look
>downward, but the pupils are visible.  This gives an unearthly
>impression of lovingness and lovableness.  The mantle that covers the
>head and falls to the feet is greenish blue with a border of purest
>gold, and scattered through with golden stars.  The tunic is rose-
>colored, patterned with lace-like design of golden flowers.  Below is
>a crescent moon, and beneath it appear the head and arms of a cherub. 
>Although he is tiny in size, he seems to be balancing the image above
>him with joyous ease.
>
>  The seer saw the Blessed Virgin as a person of his own race, and
>was firm in this conviction.  Her physiognomy in the painting bears
>him out, as also do her garments.  Her star-studded outer mantle
>resembles that of an Aztec queen.  In so appearing she showed herself
>a mother to him and to his people in a most especial way; but the
>pictures expression is archetypical of adorable motherhood in every
>race of man.
>
>  As recently the Image was preserved as if by Our Lady's special
>watchfulness from the persecutors of the Church who then ran the
>Mexican government.  They did not dare to close the basilica, so
>beloved by the Indian masses, but someone hid a bomb in a bunch of
>flowers at the altar, timed to explode at the climax of a pontifical
>high Mass.  Most of the hierarchy, as well as the Image, would be
>within its range.  The bomb went off, shattering an altarpiece, and
>twisting a big bronze cross, but not a man was hurt and the glass in
>front of the Image did not even crack.
>
>  The frames surrounding the sacred picture and the various jeweled
>crowns above it are brilliant with earthly splendor.  But the
>splendor of the Image is not of this earth, not of man's making.  The
>eyes that gaze on it now see it exactly as Bishop Zumarraga and the
>others saw it when the roses spilled from Juan's mantle and it was
>first revealed.  Millions have viewed it during the four and a
>quarter centuries since.  At the present time, some fifteen hundred
>persons kneel before it on every ordinary day, and on days of
>pilgrimages (of which there are many, every year, from other
>countries) the numbers cannot be counted.
>
>  The Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe is the Patronal Festivity of
>Mexico and is also celebrated with solemnity in the Southwest of the
>United States.  To all American Indians, we may suppose, the message
>applies as it was spoken: an end to strife and cruelty, a promise of
>solace, peace, maternal love.  To all inhabitants of the Americas,
>the Image implies a unity of brothers, a union of races acknowledging
>the fatherhood of God.  The Mother of the Incarnation of God made it
>and gave it to us all, to reaffirm and vivify the pivotal point of
>the Cree: that her Son was true God and true man, Redeemer and
>Savior.
>
>  We cannot know how long this Holy Image will remain, nor how long
>this earth of ours will endure, but the effect of Our Lady's
>appearances and gift is continuous, and God may mean the Western
>Hemisphere to play a special part in these latter days by
>exemplifying, defending, and spreading His purposes for all humanity.
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