Our Lady of Guadalupe: Roses in December
Mary appeared to a humble man on a hillside in Mexico and left behind a miracle you can still see today.
The Lady on the Hill
In December of 1531, a man named Juan Diego was walking to Mass before sunrise. He was 57 years old, an ordinary man, one of the first native Mexicans to become Catholic.
As he passed a hill called Tepeyac, he heard birdsong, beautiful and strange for winter. Then a voice called his name. At the top of the hill stood a young woman, glowing like the sunrise, dressed like an Aztec princess. She spoke to him in Nahuatl, his own language.
She said she was the Virgin Mary, the mother of the true God. She asked Juan Diego to tell the bishop to build a church on that hill, so that she could show her love to all his people.
Am I Not Here, I Who Am Your Mother?
The bishop listened politely. Then he asked for a sign. Real proof.
Meanwhile Juan Diego's uncle got very sick, and Juan Diego spent his days caring for him. He even took a different path around the hill, embarrassed that he had no sign to bring. Mary came down the hill and met him anyway.
She said the words Mexico has never forgotten: Am I not here, I who am your mother? She told him not to be afraid, and that his uncle was already healed. He was.
Roses in the Tilma
Then she sent him up the hill to gather flowers. It was December. The hill was frozen. And the hilltop was covered in roses.
Juan Diego wrapped the roses in his tilma, the rough cloak woven from cactus fiber that everyone wore. He carried them straight to the bishop and opened the cloak. The roses tumbled out, and everyone in the room fell to their knees. Printed on the cloak, in colors no one could explain, was the image of the Lady exactly as Juan Diego had described her.
A tilma like that should have fallen apart in twenty years. Juan Diego's is almost five hundred years old, and the image is still there, bright as ever, in the basilica in Mexico City. Millions of people visit her every year. You can too.
Fun Facts
- A cactus-fiber tilma normally lasts about 20 years. This one is almost 500 years old.
- She appeared as a young indigenous woman and spoke Nahuatl, Juan Diego's own language
- She's the patroness of all the Americas
- Juan Diego was declared a saint in 2002
- Her basilica in Mexico City is one of the most visited churches in the world, especially on her feast day, December 12
Want your child to get a letter from Our Lady of Guadalupe? Letters from Heaven sends a hand-illustrated letter, prayer card, sticker, and saint zine to your mailbox every month.
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