It was on this day in 1531 the Virgin of Guadalupe first appeared to the indigenous peasant Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin.
The local bishop was convinced of the reality of the vision when the Virgin caused a poncho to imprint with her image.
Who am I to argue?
Well, okay, me. It is in my nature to be suspicious of supernatural claims. In fact it is my observation that the best any such claims can rise to is inconclusive. The vast, vast majority are easily debunked.
I notice its easier for older claims to move into the realm of myth, where picky annoying folk like me can’t actually examine what happens. Jesus gets off a lot easier than Mohammed who gets off way better than Joseph Smith.
The documentation for the Virgin and even the historicity of Juan Diego is scant.
And, I don’t really care. Okay, I doubt the historicity. But, that doesn’t matter. If God’s grace were to be revealed, to whom would that be? Certainly not presidents or potentates, popes or televangelists. Rather the divine would, if God really were good, come to peasants and prostitutes, to the lost and to the forgotten…
We see our lady in her various manifestations and we are gazing upon myth, upon the songs of our hearts.
And you want to know something?
Me, I love her.
She is a vital image of the mother of the universe.
I gaze on her face and my heart feels the call of hidden truths…
I look at that image and she seems amazingly like my other favorite, Guanyin, her face echoes throughout the ages…
What I am sure of, is, if there’s a god and that god is good, he’s a she…
And when I look at that picture, well, I’m pretty sure that’s one of her many true faces…
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