Our
Lady of Guadalupe, Star of the New
Evangelization
Mother Adela, SCTJM
Foundress
For private use only
-©
In John Paul II’s
apostolic letter at the closing of the Jubilee
Year, Novo Millennio Ineunte or At the
Start of the New Millennium (NMI), he told
us in the very first lines that, after having
lived such an intense experience of grace and
mercy as was the Jubilee year, we find
resounding in our hearts today the words by
which the Christ Jesus invites the Apostle Peter
to “Go out into the deep” for a catch of
fish. Peter and the other apostles trusted the
words of Christ and threw out their nets.
“When they had done this, they caught a great
number of fish” (Luke 5:4).
Our Holy Father
told us repeatedly that the Jubilee Year was one
of abundant grace, mercy and salvation. Christ
opened wide His Heart in order to pour forth in
abundance graces of salvation over the Church
and humanity. In the apostolic letter he
clearly reveals to us his conviction: “It is
impossible to take the measure of this event of
grace which in the course of the year has
touched people's hearts. But certainly, “a
river of living water,” the water that
continually flows “from the throne of God and of
the Lamb” (cf. Rev 22:1), has been poured
out on the Church. This is the water of the
Spirit which quenches thirst and brings new life”
(NMI, 1). The Holy Father says he
feels the need to tell us that what has occurred
demands our attention, and in a certain sense,
our interpretation, in order to listen to what
the Spirit, throughout this intense year, has
said and says to the Church (NMI, 1).
Yes, what
occurred during the Jubilee Year requires from
each one of us a time of profound prayer and
serious reflection so as to consider what the
Holy Spirit is telling us after having poured
Himself out in such a particular and copious
manner. What has the Holy Spirit told us, and
what does He tell us now at the beginning of
this new Millennium? “Go out into the deep!”
The hour has come to drop the nets and to draw
out an enormous amount of fish! A river of
living water has been poured upon the Church,
and this water, when it flows, cleans and heals
all that is stagnant and putrid, and possesses a
living force that causes all that is bathed by
it to become fecund. Isn’t this the prophecy in
Ezekiel? “This water flows …[from beneath
the threshold of the temple]… and empties into
the sea, the salt waters, which it makes fresh.
Wherever the river flows, every sort of living
creature that can multiply shall live, and there
shall be abundant fish, for wherever this water
comes the sea shall be made fresh. Fishermen
shall be standing along it…spreading their nets
there. Its fish shall be…very numerous…Along
both banks of the river, fruit trees of every
kind shall grow; their leaves shall not fade,
nor their fruit fail” (cf. Ezekiel
47:1, 8-12).
The Heart of
Jesus has been opened wide. Grace has poured
forth. Now it is only necessary that we
actively and responsibly cooperate in the
transformation of our hearts by an authentic
life of holiness and go forth generously and
with ardor in the fulfillment of our mission.
Go out into
the Deep
I believe that
the oars in which the boat of the Church will go
forth out into the deep, in order to draw out
the miraculous catch of fish, will be
holiness and mission. Both are
fruits of the action of the Holy Spirit.
Holiness and mission should move harmoniously in
order to lead the boat out into the deep with a
new force. Both will empower the Church so that
it will shine in the world as a torch of faith,
hope and love. Both will open new paths by
which the Church encounters the men and women of
today. These encounters include anxious and
often disorientated hearts . . .the needs of the
people, their struggles and desires, their
questions, concerns and fears. Both oars ought
to direct the boat of the Church of the Third
Millennium with confidence, determination, and
diligence through the midst of the great waves
that threaten it. It is guided with assurance
to the port of the designs of God by the
Luminous Star who is the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Fishermen and navigators, well before the modern
age of electricity, would depend upon the stars
in order to plan a course for their voyage
through the vast ocean. We can see through this
analogy that the Blessed Virgin Mary, as Star of
the Sea, guides us through the turbulent waters
of our lives into the sure port who is Christ.
We have seen a
river of water being poured forth over the
Church (NMI, 1). The Holy Spirit has
been poured forth as on the day of Pentecost, in
order to change hearts of stone into hearts of
flesh, to transform lives, to heal blindness, to
free the oppressed and to lift up the
paralytics. The Holy Spirit has also been
poured forth as on the day of Pentecost to make
us courageous enough to enter into the world and
not be afraid of its contradiction; to make us
richer by the many charisms He distributes in
the Body of Christ; to make us experience His
power; to make us younger in our joy and
enthusiasm to proclaim the Gospel; to make us
free to live as children of God and to be ardent
witnesses of the Gospel of Love. Yes, the Holy
Spirit has been poured forth upon us to renew
our hearts in order to send us into the field of
the world so as to fulfill the mission of the
New Evangelization: new in ardor, new in
methods, and new in expression. The Holy
Spirit has been poured forth to lead us to a
life of holiness, and to send us forward on this
urgent mission of the evangelization of our
contemporary world.
The hour has come
and we must be punctual. The Church as a whole
and each one of us have received this call at
the start of the Third Millennium. We have to
go out, drop the nets, and draw out the fish
that will nourish us with life and truth in
Christ. None of us can feel excluded from this
urgent call. On the contrary, the captain of
the boat is Peter, the Holy Father, but the oars
are rowed by the members of the Church. The
sure guide for our path through the ocean is Our
Blessed Mother. The hour has come so that,
testifying with the power of the Holy Spirit, we
may go forward to the New Evangelization which
is so needed in our world today.
Why a New
Evangelization?
Evangelization is
not just a work of the Church today, but
rather it has been the life of the
Church. “Woe to me if I do not preach [the
Gospel]” (1 Cor. 9:16). There exists an entire
history of evangelization, just as there is a
history of the Church – a history that has come
about through the encounter of the Church with
the different cultures of each age and with each
generation. To the extent that the inhabited
world grew, the Church also found herself in
front of new efforts of evangelization. For
this reason, the Church has always seen herself
– and considers herself still – in the state
of mission. The Church evangelizes, the
Church announces Christ, who is the Way, the
Truth and the Life. The Church renews each day,
and in each generation and historic moment, its
struggle against the spirit of this world. It
is a struggle which is nothing but the fight for
‘the soul of the world.’ We know that at this
time, there exists a powerful
anti-evangelization effort that has at its
disposal means and programs and works with power
and force – powerfully opposing the Gospel and
all the efforts of evangelization. The struggle
found in the modern world is enormous (cf. John
Paul II, Crossing the Threshold of Hope,
p.105-117). As Cardinal Wojtyla (John Paul II)
said during his visit to the United States, “it
is a decisive moment of battle.”
“Our world feels
an urgent need for the Gospel. Perhaps we feel
this need precisely because the world seems to
be distancing itself from the Gospel, or rather
because the world has not yet drawn near to the
Gospel” (John Paul II, Crossing the Threshold
of Hope, p.114).
The expression,
New Evangelization, presented first by
Pope Paul VI in his Apostolic Exhortation
Evangelii Nuntiandi (EN), comes from
the new challenges that the contemporary world
brings to the mission of the Church. The Church
must present the Gospel in the midst of these
great challenges of the modern world. For the
Church, for all of us, to evangelize means to
bring the Good News to all sectors of humanity
and, with its influence, transform it from
within, renewing humanity itself. “Behold, I
make all things new” (Rev 21:22). However,
the truth is that humanity is not renewed unless
men and women are renewed first. The goal of
evangelization is an interior change of the
human heart. The message proclaimed by the
Church seeks to convert the personal, as well as
the collective, consciences of men and women,
including the activities that they partake in
and their concrete environments (EN,18).
All
Evangelization is preceded by the maternal
presence of the Virgin Mary . . . the Star that
guides the ship!
In the arms of
the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Word-made-Flesh was
presented to the world. She brought Jesus to
the world and to our history . . . She, who was
filled with His presence, went in haste to serve
Her cousin Elizabeth, and just by the Blessed
Mother’s greeting, Elizabeth was filled with the
Holy Spirit.
Who better than
Mary can reveal Christ? Was it not in Her arms
that the world – the shepherds (representing
Israel) and the wise men (the Gentiles) – found
Jesus? Is it not She who presents Christ to the
world? Is it not She who, as teacher and
singular witness, reveals to the newly born
Church the mysteries of Christ? Yes, sitting at
the school of the Heart of Mary is where we
learn the deepest mysteries of Christ!
In order to
evangelize it is necessary to first become a
witness of the life of Christ: Singular
witnesses of the Mysteries of Christ.
“Having lived her condition as a disciple of the
Lord perfectly, she calls Christians to progress
on the path of a fervent life in accordance with
the Gospel” (John Paul II, Letter to Cardinal
Paul Tung, December 16, 1997).
To evangelize is
to announce Christ, the Savior of mankind. It
is here that we find the reason for the Church’s
existence. It is Mary who has an irreplaceable
role in the announcement of Christ. She is
present in the three phases of the history of
salvation: before Christ, during the life of
Christ, and in the time of the Church. Her fiat
brought the Messiah into the world. She was
singularly associated to His redemptive mission
and She is the Mother of the Church. Mary plays
an active role in the passing from one phase to
another, as well as in the encounter of the
Church with each generation and historic
moments.
It is necessary
to understand the importance of the testimony of
life which precedes the testimony of words.
Only witnesses are credible; only those who
testify with their lives are able to touch
hearts and minds that are confused and
disorientated. Paul VI told us: “Modern man
listens more willingly to witnesses than to
teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it
is because they are witnesses” (EN, 41).
This is why the person of the Blessed Virgin
Mary illuminates the mission of Evangelization.
She is the evangelizer because She is a living
Gospel, a true model whom the evangelizer is
able to present to the person to whom he has
proposed the saving message as the highest
realization of the Christian message.
In order to come
to know Christ more profoundly, as well as to be
able to make Him known, the Church ought to look
to the Blessed Virgin Mary. She has known Him
perfectly since She bore Him in Her own womb,
and also because She is the one who can better
reveal Him to the world, as it was through Her
that Christ the Savior came into the world. If
we want to know Christ better, the Church,
rather each one of us, ought to enter into the
Heart of the Blessed Virgin and there find
Jesus. There we can give Him to others with the
same love, fidelity, zeal and veracity with
which She has given Him to us.
Star of the
New Evangelization
“Where is the
newborn king of the Jews? We saw his star at
its rising and have come to do him homage . . .
They set out. And behold, the star that they had
seen at its rising preceded them, until it came
and stopped over the place where the child was.
They were overjoyed at seeing the star” (Mt 2:2,
9-10).
A star is a
celestial body that shines at night – a
celestial body that shines in the darkness of
sinfulness, error, and lack of faith. It
shines, bringing with it Him who is the Light of
the world. Mary is the star of the third
millennium just as in the beginning of the
Christian era She was the dawn that preceded
Christ over the horizon of human history. In
effect, Mary was chronologically born before
Christ; She conceived Him and inserted Him in
our human history.
“ . . . Mary appeared on the
horizon of salvation history before Christ.
It is a fact that when ‘the fullness of time’
was definitively drawing near - the saving
advent of Emmanuel - He who was from eternity
destined to be His Mother already existed on
earth. The fact that she ‘preceded’ the coming
of Christ is reflected every year in the liturgy
of Advent. Therefore, if to that ancient
historical expectation of the Savior we compare
these years which are bringing us closer to the
end of the second Millennium after Christ and to
the beginning of the third, it becomes fully
comprehensible that in this present period we
wish to turn in a special way to her, the one
who in the ‘night’ of the Advent expectation
began to shine like a true ‘Morning Star’ (Stella
Matutina). For just as this star, together
with the ‘dawn,’ precedes the rising of the sun,
so Mary from the time of her Immaculate
Conception preceded the coming of the Savior,
the rising of the ‘Sun of Justice’ in the
history of the human race” (John Paul II,
Redemptoris Mater [RM], 3).
Yes, we need the
Sun of Justice to shine with great force over
the darkness of our contemporary world. We need
the Star which proceeds Him to shine, that star
which leads the wise men to His encounter.
It is the dawn
that precedes and reveals the Sun of Justice who
is Jesus Christ. It ought to be known and
manifested so that the Divine Sun may be also
known (St. Luis de Montfort, True Devotion to
Mary, no.120). The great works of God and
of the Church are always preceded and prepared
by Our Blessed Mother. The great works of
evangelization that the Church realizes are
preceded by the Star of Evangelization, the
Blessed Virgin Mary . . . and the new
evangelization cannot be different. Pope Pius
XII made a remarkable statement about our times
being a Marian era ‘par excellence.’
This New
Evangelization, in which the American Continent
is on the forefront, is directed by the Blessed
Virgin just as it was so in the first
evangelization. “To conclude, I would like to
turn my thoughts to Tepeyac, to Our Lady of
Guadalupe, Star of the first and the new
evangelization of America. To her I entrust the
pilgrim Church in Mexico and the American
continent, and I fervently ask her to guide her
children, so that they will enter the third
millennium with faith and hope” (John Paul II,
Homily, January 24, 1999).
How did the
Star of the Firt Evangelization of this
continent manifest Herself?
The
evangelization of America was, from its
beginnings, marked by the Marian presence. We
are able to say that the historical and cultural
identity of the Latin American countries “is
symbolized in a most luminous manner in the
“mestiza” countenance of Mary of Guadalupe, who
has revealed herself at the beginning of the
evangelization (cf. John Paul II, Address at
the Opening of the Fourth General Conference of
Latin American Bishops, October 12, 1992,
no.24).
The
discovery of the New World: Our Continent
The Church was
losing many children because of the Reformation,
but Our Lady gave birth to many others… In
Spain, Christopher Columbus prayed in front of
the image of the Lady of Guadalupe before he
began his voyage, and he took a replica of the
image with him on his journey. The ship on
which Columbus sailed was called the Santa
Maria. Next, the day America was discovered
was the 12th of October, feast day of our Lady
of the Pillar. This was an apparition of our
Lady to the Apostle James as he was trying to
evangelize Spain. The first prayer said in the
New World was the Salve Regina – prayed
by Columbus and his companions.
However, a few
years after its discovery, as in the case of the
apostle James, the work of evangelization in the
Americas was not bearing fruit. Therefore, the
Blessed Mother appeared in the New World to an
Indian named Juan Diego – a very simple, humble
and childlike heart to whom, I believe, was
entrusted with one of the most beautiful
messages of Our Lady. What an entrustment!
The Tilma and
the Image
Our Lady of
Guadalupe left Her image imprinted on Juan
Diego’s tilma as a permanent gift for the whole
Continent and for the world. The tilma, a rough
material that would never be used to paint an
image upon, was the one Our Lady used – not to
leave a painting of Herself, but a miraculous
“living image,” as it has been defined. Perhaps
with this sign, She is trying to call us to give
Her the rough material of our hearts so as to
allow Her to imprint Her image on them.
“Blessed Virgin
Mary, like St. Juan Diego, may we take your
imprinted image along the path of our lives and
announce the Good News of Christ to all men!” (Prayer
of John Paul II).
She appeared as
a “mestiza,” one who was a mixture of Indian and
Spanish descent. Her hands, one of which was
darker than the other, were united in prayer; in
this way our Mother came to unite the two races
and cultures. She used signs and languages that
were understandable to both the Indian and the
Spanish priests.
As well, She had
a sash at Her waste indicating that She was
pregnant. On Her womb, a flower with four
leaves was depicted – the Aztec sign of
divinity. In this manner the image indicated
that the Lady was with child and that Her child
was God. Through all the details on the image,
Our Lady directed the Indian people down the
path that leads to the true God and to a deeper
realization that they had been redeemed.
Furthermore, the
brooch on Her neck had a cross on it like those
the Indian people had seen on the Spanish
ships. Her eyes, according to the scientific
studies, depict the images of Juan Diego, the
bishop, the friars, and a family who were
present when the tilma was unfolded. Her eyes
were looking down, revealing Her maternal love
and care promised in Her messages.
The stars on Her
mantel were the constellations of the sky that
night. These indicate that She is the star that
shines in the darkness. For the Indians, the
stars, moon and sun were gods, and Our Lady came
with the stars as a mantel, covered by the sun,
and with the moon under Her feet. They were at
Her service, as She is the Queen of heaven and
earth. Also, the stars remind me of the promise
of God to Abraham: “Look up at the sky and count
the stars, if you can . . . so shall your
descendants be” (Gen 15:5). Perhaps Our Lady
came to tell us that She was going to bring many
children to this land . . . She was going to
give birth to Christ in this new World and
multiply the descendants of the Church.
It is thought
that Our Lady used the Aztec words nahuatl de
coatlaxopeuh, which is pronounced
“quatlasupe” and thus sounds very much like the
Spanish word Guadalupe. Coa means
serpent, tla is the article “the,”
and xopeuh means to crush.
Therefore, Our Lady referred to Herself as the
one who “crushes the serpent.” Actually,
the Tepeyac was the temple of the “divine
mother, serpent.” With Her appearance, Our Lady
transformed it into ‘the little house’ of the
Blessed Mother and the most visited Marian
shrine in the world. It was the place where
many human sacrifices, particularly of children,
were done, and it now has become a powerful
place of life.
We also ought to
remember that the Aztecs would annually offer
more than 20,000 men, women and children as
human sacrifices to their gods. These rites
would often include the cannibalism of the
victims’ bodies. In 1487, on the occasion of
the dedication of a new temple in Tenochtitlan,
about 80,000 captives were immolated in human
sacrifice, in a single ceremony that lasted
about four days. Certainly in Mexico, with the
conversion of millions of the inhabitants to
Christianity, Our Lady crushed the head of the
serpent. “May the continent of hope be the
continent of life! …The time has come to banish
once and for all from the continent every attack
against life” (John Paul II, Homily,
Jan. 23, 1999).
Moreover, She appeared on December 9th.
At that time, some countries celebrated the
Feast of the Immaculate Conception on that
day. She came to us as a Catechist. Already
in the first message She gave us a powerful
summary of who She is and Her mission towards
us, Her children: “Know
and understand, you, the smallest of my
children, that I am the ever Virgin Mary, the
Mother of the true God for whom we live: of the
Creator from whom all things are - Lord of
heaven and earth. I most ardently desire that
you build here a temple for me, so that in it, I
can manifest and give all of my love,
compassion, help and protection, as I am your
loving Mother – of all of you who live together
on earth, of all of humanity, and of all those
who love and admire me and who invoke me and
confide in me. There I will listen to their
cries and to their pain, and I will remedy their
miseries, pains and sufferings” (Words of
Our Lady to St. Juan Diego, December 9,
1531).
Through the
intervention of the Blessed Virgin, three
thousand conversions took place every day. It
was a daily Pentecost. Isn’t this what is
necessary for the New Evangelization in a world
so paganized, so full of idols and false gods?
America, a Marian Continent
The
evangelization of America was marked, from its
beginning, by a Marian presence.
“May love for the
Mother of God, so characteristic of American
piety, help guide your own life according to the
spirit and values of the Gospel, so that you may
bear witness to them in the world. Our Lady of
Guadalupe, intimately associated with the birth
of the Church in America, was the radiant Star
which illumined the proclamation of Christ the
Savior to the children of these peoples, helping
the first missionaries in their evangelization.
I ask her, who bore the ‘Good News of God’ in
her womb to help them be witnesses of Christ to
others” (John Paul II, Angelus Message in
Mexico, January 24, 1999).
The following are
all places where Mary has manifested Her
presence in the New World:
Mexico: Guadalupe; Argentina:
Virgin de Lugan; Bolivia: Our Lady of
Copacabana; Brazil: La Aparecida.
Canada: Nta Dame du Cap;
Colombia: Chiquinquirá; Costa Rica: Our Lady of
the Angels; Cuba: Our Lady Charity; Nicaragua:
the Immaculate; Panamá: Holy Mary of Antigua;
Puerto Rico: Our Lady of Providence; Perú: Our
Lady of Mercy; Dominican Republic: Our Lady of
Altagracia; Venezuela: Our Lady of Coromoto;
San Salvador: Our Lady of Peace; Paraguay: Our
Lady of Caucupé; Honduras: Our Lady of Suyapa;
Guatemala: Our Lady of the Rosary.
This is why, in
the heart of America, Our Lady appeared and
miraculously imprinted Her image as a sign of
Her continual presence. It is Her presence in
the Heart of America. John Paul II has called
the Basilica of Guadalupe, during his homily at
the Conclusion of the Synod of America in Rome,
the Marian heart of America. “We have
concluded the Synod’s work on the day dedicated
to Our Lady of Guadalupe, the first witness to
Christ’s presence in America. Her shrine in the
heart of the American continent represents an
indelible reminder of the evangelization
achieved in the past five centuries . . . Virgin
of Guadalupe, Mother of all America, help us to
be faithful stewards of the great mysteries of
God . . . Help us to confirm our brothers and
sisters in the faith! Queen of peace! Save the
nations and peoples of the whole continent who
trust in you” (John Paul II, Homily, Dec.
12, 1997).
There is a Marian
heart in our Continent, the ‘little house’ that
Our Lady wanted to have built for all of Her
children to go and to listen to Her maternal
heart saying, “Do not be frightened or
worried; do not let your heart be troubled; do
not fear that sickness or any other sickness or
anguish. Am I not here? Am I not here who am
your Mother? Are you not under my shadow and
protection? Am I not the source of your joy?
Are you not in the hallow of my mantle, in the
embrace of my arms? What else do you need? Do
not be troubled or afflicted about anything”
(Fourth Apparition to Juan Diego, Dec.
12, 1531).
The Holy Father,
John Paul II, in his urgent call to the New
Evangelization – new because it confronts
challenges never before presented to the Church
– invites us to turn our hearts and our glance
to the Blessed Virgin Mary, who is the guide and
shining beacon for the Christian on the sea of
life (John Paul II, World Youth Day,
August 20, 1989). She is also the Star that
evokes the Marian seal of the works of
Evangelization. She, the Spouse of the Holy
Spirit, invites us to unite with Her ardent
prayer calling upon the transforming power of
the Holy Spirit upon the Church and the world.
She wants to form witnesses of Christ in the
world, living agents of the New Evangelization
that John Paul II signaled as the primary work
of the Church in the Third Millennium.
Conclusion
“We ought to
remember and be grateful for the role which the
Virgin Mary has played in the evangelization of
our continent. She shows us Christ and leads us
to him. She, the Mother of Jesus, has truly
been the Star of Evangelization, which proceeds
and accompanies her children in the pilgrimage
of faith and hope . . . We cannot announce
Christ, true God and true Man, without speaking
of the Virgin Mary, His Mother. We cannot
confess faith in the Incarnation without
proclaiming, as the Church has done from of old,
that the Son of God was conceived by the power
of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary.
We cannot contemplate the mystery of the
redeeming death of Christ without remembering
the one whom participated in a singular manner
in His suffering, and whom Christ himself, from
the Cross, has given to us as Mother and has
entrusted to us, so that we would receive her as
one of the most precious gifts that He has left
to us. In this manner, with the Gospel of
Christ, the Church receives the announcement of
the maternal presence of Mary in the life of
Christians . . . Just as in the new formed
Church at Pentecost, the figure of Mary is
present in all the beginnings of
evangelization. The Virgin offers to us her
Divine Son and invites us to believe in Him as
Master of Truth and Bread of Life” (John Paul II,
Message to the Marian Congress in Venezuela,
May 13, 1992).
May Our Lady
guide the Church of America, a Church called to
be in the forefront of the New Evangelization,
to be totally disposed to be moved by the power
of the Spirit and to communicate – with a
greater freedom, a renewed courage, and a
youthful enthusiasm – the Gospel of Love and the
Gospel of Life.
Our Lady of
Guadalupe, Star of the New Evangelization, pray
for us!
St. Joseph,
custodian of the life of the womb of the Blessed
Mother, pray for us!
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