St. Juan Diego & the Good Effort
Modern Science Still Can't Explain What Happened to a Humble Man on an Inspired Mission
I like to walk to Church.
It’s a little under four miles away and takes me almost an hour.
Today, Wednesday, Dec. 11, will be one of those days.
Dec. 12 is the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, recalling a series of events dating to the first half of the 1500s in what is now Mexico. The bulk of the celebrating takes place tonight, the eve of the feast day.
The remarkable unfolding of history centered on Our Lady of Guadalupe shows the best of the emergence of Christianity in the Americas and left a legacy that has baffled modern science.
And it all started with a man going for a walk.
The ‘new world’
The Early Church spread through politically anarchist means, first in the Mediterranean Sea region (though the Apostle Thomas is reported to have gone all the way to India).
The “Christianity” of the Roman Emperor Constantine, sadly, forged an evangelization mixed with conquest throughout Europe’s sphere of influence. The Age of Exploration brought Europeans across the Atlantic Ocean, and religious missionaries favored by political rulers could sometimes join voyages.
Large Christian settlements in the Americas appeared in the early 16th Century, beginning in present-day Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, where the Roman Catholic Church — esteemed by the regime of Spain — established dioceses in 1511. The mainland would soon get dioceses in present-day Mexico, including Mexico City in 1530.
On Dec. 9, 1531, an Aztec man who was an early Catholic convert, Juan Diego (whose original name was Cuauhtlatoatzin, “the Talking Eagle”), did something very ordinary for him: He traveled around 15 miles on foot, crossing Tepeyac Hill on the outskirts of Mexico City, to worship at daily Mass (the term “Mass” is from the Latin root “missio” — sending forth — and refers to the Catholic celebration of the Eucharist).
Juan Diego was definitely on a “mission,” in more ways than one — more than he initially realized! — because on this morning, something jolted his routine.
He saw a vision of Mary, the mother of Jesus, and heard a call to build a shrine on that hill. He told the bishop of Mexico City about it that very day.
The bishop was hesitant, but Juan Diego and Mary were persistent!
From Encyclopedia Britannica:
Mary appeared to Juan Diego a second time on December 9 after his meeting that day with the bishop and told him to return and try again.
On December 10 Juan Diego met with the bishop, who this time demanded a sign before he would approve construction of a church. Mary then appeared a third time to Juan Diego, who told her of the bishop’s demand for a sign.
On December 12, she made her fourth appearance, ordering Juan Diego to collect roses from the hill and bring them to the bishop. Miraculously, there were roses blooming on the hill, despite it being winter. Moreover, the roses were native to Castile, a region in Spain that was the homeland of the bishop. In his audience with the bishop on that day, Juan Diego opened his tilma (cloak), letting dozens of roses fall to the floor and revealing the image of Mary imprinted on the inside of the cloak.
The bishop was convinced! And after the worship site was built, Juan Diego lived in a hut next door and cared for shrine visitors.
The tilma enigma
Social change happened rapidly in Mexico. An estimated 10 million people converted to Christianity in the first 10 years after the appearance of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Indigenous storytelling traditions, including dance and music, contributed to the widespread evangelization, showing the value of communicating across cultures.
To their credit, many of the Franciscan friars who came to Mexico from Europe learned the Nahuatl language of the native people to converse with them and to transcribe and preserve some of their songs and poems.
Meanwhile, a lack of change would eventually become the most famous part of the history: the cloak, or “tilma” as it’s traditionally called.
Juan Diego’s tilma was made from materials that tend to deteriorate after about 15 to 30 years. But his tilma survives to this day, baffling scientists who’ve studied the composition of the fabric. Researchers also lack a scientific explanation for the resilience and microscopic details in the image of Mary, which contains many narrative and historical elements in its pictographic particulars.
If the tilma is a forgery, it’s a fake far beyond modern technology, let alone any known to have existed several hundred years ago.
Do good things
When asked about saints and miracles, I answer that I’m more impressed by the good things people do than by the amazing things that happen to those people.
To me, the most beautiful aspect of the events over those four days in December nearly 500 years ago — more than the apparitions, the roses, the image on the tilma, the reaction of the bishop, or anything else — is this: Juan Diego was going to Mass.
He developed his conscience, took seriously the presence of the transcendent in his life, and made considerable daily sacrifices to practice his faith with others. He prepared himself — unknowingly, at first! — to be an apostle for his time, in his homeland, by orienting himself properly in the world and making the good effort.
I have barely one quarter of his distance to travel, and there are no hills like Tepeyac along my route.
But I’ll be thinking about Juan Diego today on my walk.
Hey, speaking of good effort …
… I like hearing from readers and engaging in written exchanges with everyone who makes the good effort to leave a Comment!
Do you walk places?
Ever make a pilgrimage to Mexico City or other sites to witness things that hold great meaning for you?
Anything else on your mind after perusing today’s article?
Let me know your thoughts below …
—
Find the book, Good Neighbor, Bad Citizen:
Amazon (paperback & Kindle)
Barnes&Noble (paperback)
Lulu (paperback)
Find me on X: https://x.com/GoodNeighBadCit
To those who believe, no sign is necessary. To those who don't believe, no sign is sufficient.
The best proof for Christianity is that it exists. It survived its first 300 years under horrendous, if intermittent, persecution. A multitude of believers bore witness by opting for death over recantation. You have to wonder why.
The signs are there nonetheless. They are well-documented: the Shroud of Turin, the triumph at Lepanto, Fatima, the eucharistic miracles, and the tilma of Juan Diego.
Full disclosure: part of me would just as soon practice happy-go-lucky paganism. But there's no way around it. Christ is King.
I like to walk or tricycle to church and prayer group. I don't travel nearly as much as you or Juan on that journey though. BUT it is part of my changing my mind about how things are done around here.