Our Lady of Guadalupe, Star of the New Evangelization by Mother Adela Galindo, SCTJM For private use only -© In the Apostolic Letter at the Closing of the Jubilee Year “Novo Millennio Ineunte” (NMI-At the start of the New Millennium), John Paul II, told us in his 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 of abundant grace, mercy and salvation.  “Christ has opened wide His Heart in order to pour forth abundantly, graces of salvation upon the Church and over humanity.”  And in the Apostolic Letter he clearly reveals to us his conviction: “It is impossible to measure the effusion of grace which, during this year, has touched the consciences.  Without doubt, a river of living water, that which comes constantly flows from the Lamb, has been poured upon the Church.  It is the water of the Holy Spirit which quenches our thirst and renews...  That is why I experience and obligation to direct myself to you.  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 of 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 in such a particular and copious manner.  What has the Holy Spirit told us and tells 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, it 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 in fact, the prophecy of Ezekiel 47, 8-12?  “The 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.”  The Heart of Jesus has opened wide.   The grace has been poured forth, now, it is only necessary that we actively and responsibly cooperate in the transformation of our hearts in authentic life of holiness and to go forth generously and with ardor in the fulfillment of our mission. Go out into the Deep I believe that the oars with 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, fruits of the action of the Holy Spirit, should be moving harmoniously in order to lead the boat out into the deep with a new force.  Both empowering the Church so that it will shine in the world as a torch of faith, hope and love.  Both opening new paths by which the Church encounters the men and women of today, encounters their anxious and often disorientated hearts, their needs, 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 in the midst of the great waves that threaten it, but 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 on the stars in order to set out a course for their voyage through the vast ocean.  From this fact we see the analogy with the Blessed Virgin Mary, who, as the Star of the Sea, guides us through the turbulent waters of our lives unto 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 in the day of Pentecost, in order to change the hearts of stone into hearts of flesh; in order to transform lives, to heal blindness, to free the oppressed and to lift up the paralytic.  The Holy Spirit has been poured forth as in the day of Pentecost, in order to make us courageous 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 makes experience his power, to make us younger in our joy and enthusiasm to proclaim the Gospel, in order 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 and to send us into the field of the world 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 the most urgent mission of the Evangelization of our contemporary world. The hour has come and we must be punctual.  All of the Church and each one of us has 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, and 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, it has been the life of the Church.  “Woe to me if I do not Evangelize” (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, the encounter with each generation.  To the extent that the inhabited world grew, the Church also found itself in front of new efforts of evangelization.  For this reason, the Church has always seen itself and considers itself 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, a struggle which is nothing but the fight for “the soul of the world”.  We know that at this time, there exists a most powerful anti-evangelization effort, that has at its disposal means and programs and power and force, all of which opposes the Gospel and all the works of evangelization with great strength.  The struggle found in the modern world is enormous. As Cardinal Wojtyla said during his visit to the United States: “it is a decisive moment of battle” “In the contemporary world we can perceive a special need for the Gospel, in the prospect of the third millennium.  We can see this most special need probably because the world seems to be growing away from the Gospel, or else, because the Gospel has not yet entered to this world.” (JPII, Crossing the Threshold of Hope, chapter 18) The Expression, New Evangelization, presented first by Pope Paul VI in his Apostolic Exhortation “Evangelii Nuntiandi” comes from the new challenges that the contemporary world brings to the mission of the Church.  It is to 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 the sectors of humanity, and with its influence, transform from within, renewing humanity itself.  “See, I make all things new.” Rev. 21.  However, the truth is that humanity is not renewed unless men and women are renewed first.  The goal of evangelization is this, this interior change of the human heart.  The message proclaimed by the Church seeks to convert the personal as well as the collective conscious of men and women, 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 leads the boat! 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, filled with his presence went in haste to  serve her cousin Elizabeth, and just by the Blessed Mother’s greeting she was filled with the Holy Spirit. Who better than Mary can reveal Christ?  Was it not in her arms that the world, shepherds (Israel) Wise men (pagans) found Jesus?  Is it not she who presents Christ to the world?  Is it no her 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 that 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 witness of the Mysteries of Christ (MR, 26) “She, who lived in a perfect manner the condition of a disciple of the Lord, animates all Christians to go forward on the path of a most fervent Gospel life”  (JPII 12/16/97). To evangelize is to announce Christ, the Savior of mankind.  It is here that we find the reason for the Church’s existence.  But 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, in the time of the Church: Her fiat brought about 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 moment.  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 men and women of today listen more to those who testify with their lives then to those who teach with their words, and if they were to listen to teachers, it would only be because they are witnesses”.  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, who has known Him perfectly since she bore Him in her own womb, but 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.  The Church, each one of us, if we want to know Christ better, ought to enter into the heart of the Blessed Virgin and there, find Jesus, giving 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, 2-11)  A star is a celestial body that shines at night. Celestial body that shines in the darkness of sinfulness, of error, of the lack of faith; it shines bringing with it Him who is the light of the world. She 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 before Christ in the horizon of the history of salvation. (6) It is a fact that, as the definitive moment for “fullness of time” was drawing near, that salvific presence of the Emmanuel, the one who had been destined from all eternity to be his Mother already existed on earth.  Her “preceding” the coming of Christ is reflected every year in the liturgy of Advent.  As such, if in the coming years of the conclusion of the second Millennium after Christ and the beginning of the third  refers us to the age-old historic watching for the Savior, it is fully understandable that at this moment we wish to direct ourselves in a particular manner to Her who, in the night of the Advent expectation began to shine as a true “morning star” (Stella matutina).  Just as this star, together with the dawn precedes the appearance of the son, in the same manner, Mary, from her Immaculate Conception has preceded the coming of the Savior, the appearance of the sun of justice, in the history of the human race. (MR, 3) Yes, we need that the Sun of Justice shine with great force over the darkness of our contemporary world, we need for that the Star which proceeds Him, to shine, that star that lead 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. (S. Luis of Montfort,Treatise on True Devotion) 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 can not be different. Pope Pius XII made a remarkable statement about our times being a Marian era per excellence. This New Evangelization, in which the American Continent is found in the forefront, is directed by the Blessed Virgin just as it was so in the first evangelization.  “As I concluded, I desire to direct my thoughts to the Hill of Tepeyac, to Our Lady of Guadalupe, Star of the first and of the new evangelization of America.  To her I entrust the Church which pilgrims in Mexico and in the American Continent, “continent of hope” and I ardently ask her to accompany her children as we enter with faith and hope in the Third Millennium.” (Homily of JPII in the Basilica of Guadalupe, 1999) How did the Star of the First Evangelization of this continent manifest herself? The evangelization of America was, from its beginnings, marked by the Marian presence, in such a forceful and vigorous manner, that it is with reason, that 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. (Puebla 1979) The discovery of the New World: our Continent The Church was loosing many children because of the Reformation… Our Lady gives birth to many others… Christopher Columbus prays in front of the image of the Lady of Guadalupe in Spain before he begins his voyage.  He takes a replica of the image with him. The ship in which Columbus sails is the Santa Maria. The day America is discovered is the 12th of October, feast day of our Lady of the Pilar.  It 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.  A few years after its discovery, as in the case of the Apostle James, the work of evangelization was not bearing fruit.  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, one of the most beautiful messages of Our Lady were entrusted to. 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 your own image, is the one Our Lady used, not to leave a painting of herself, but a miraculous image, a “living image”, as it has been defined.  Maybe, with this sign, She is trying to call us to give her the rough material of our hearts and allow her to imprint her image in them. “Blessed Virgin Mary, like Saint 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 JPII) She appeared as a “mestiza”, a mixture between Indian and Spanish.  Her hands, each representing the two colors, were united in prayer and in this way our Mother came to unite the two races and cultures. She used signs and languages that were understandable to both: Indians and the Spanish priests. She has a sash at her waste: she is pregnant!.  Upon her womb, a flower of four leaves is depicted, the Aztec sign of divinity.  In this manner it was revealed that the Lady was with child and that her child was God. Through all the details on the image, our Lady directed the Indians down the path to the true God.  And to the realization that they had been redeemed. The brooch on her neck had a cross on it, in the same manner as those the Indians had seen on the Spanish ships. Her eyes, according to the scientific studies, depict the images of Juan Diego, the bishop, friars and a family who were present when the tilma was unfolded.   Her eyes are looking down just revealing her maternal love and care promised in her messages. The stars on her mantel: She is the star that shines in the darkness.  The stars in her mantle were the constellation of the sky that night. For the Indians the stars, moon and sun were gods, our Lady comes with the stars as a mantel, covered by the sun and with the moon under her feet… they are at her service, 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, just so, shall your descendants be”.  (Gen 15,5)  Maybe, 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 word (nahuatl) de coatlaxopeuh, which is pronounced “quatlasupe” and thus sounds very much like the Spanish world Guadalupe.  Coa means serpiente, tla is the article “the”, while xopeuh means aplastar, (to crush).  Therefore Our Lady refers 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 to be “the little house” of the Blessed Mother, the marian shrine most visited in the world.”  The place were more human sacrifices, particularly of children, were done, has become such a powerful place of life. We ought to remember that the Aztec would annual offer more than 20,000 men, women and children as human sacrifices o their gods, rites that often would include the cannibalism of the victim’s 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 moment has come in which to make disappear once and for all, and in all places in this continent, all attacks against life”. She appears on December 9th, the day that at that time the Church celebrated the feast of the Immaculate Conception. She came to us as a Catechist, just in the first message she gave us a powerful summary of whom 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 you loving Mother, of all of you who live together on earth and 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 redeem their miseries, pains and sufferings.” Through the intervention of the Blessed Virgin, 3 thousand conversions took place daily.  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 the Marian presence.  “The love for the Mother of God, so characteristic of the American religiosity, helps to guide one’s life according to the spirit and the values of the Gospel, in order to give witness to them in the world.  Our Lady of Guadalupe, intimately united with the birth of the Church in America, was the radiant Star that illuminated the announcement of Christ the Savior to the children of those lands, thus helping the first missionaries in their evangelization.  To Her, who bore in her womb, “the Gospel of God” (EN7) I ask that she help you be witnesses of Christ for others”. (JPII, Angelus Message in Mexico, 24 of Juanary, 1999) Mexico: Guadlupe; Argentina: V. de Lugan; Bolivia: Ntra Sra de Copacabana; Brazil: La Aparecida. Canada: Nta Dame du Cap; Colombia: Chiquinquirá; Costa Rica: OL of the Angels; Cuba: OL Caridad del Cobre; Nicaragua: The Inmaculada; Panamá: Holy Mary of Antigua; Puerto Rico: Our Lady of Providence; Perú: OL of Mercy; Rep. Dominicana: OL of  Altagracia; Venezuela: OL of Coromoto; San Salvador: OL of Peace; Paraguay: OL of Caucupé; Honduras: OL of Suyapa; Guatemala: OL 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.  Her presence in the Heart of America.  John Paul II called the Basilica of Guadalupe, during this homily at the Conclusion of the Synod of America, the Marian heart of America. You who have entered in the heart of America…. O Lady and Mother of America!  Confirm our faith!  Blessed Virgin of Gudalupe, Queen of peace!  Save the nations and peoples of this continent.” 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 listen to her maternal heart saying: “It is nothing that causes you to fear and afflicts you; do not let your heart be troubled; to not fear that sickness or any other sickness or anguish.  Am I not here? Am I not your Mother?  Arent you under my shadow?  Am I not your health?  Aren’t you for sure in the cross of my hands?  What else do you have need for?  Do not be troubled or uneasy about anything.” The Holy Father, John Paul II,  in his urgent call to the New Evangelization, new because it confronts the challenges never before presented to the Church, tell us:  “Look to the star, invoke Mary, she is always a lighthouse, a stronghold and a motivation for the Christian as he navigates through the turbulent seas of this world” (WYD, August 21,1989).  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 JPII signaled as the primary work of the Church of 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.”  (cf. JPII, May 13, 1992 to the Marian Congress in Venezuela) May Our Lady guide the Church of America, called to be in the forefront of the New Evangelization, be totally disposed to be moved by the power of the Spirit and to communicate with a greater freedom, with a renewed courage and with a youthful enthusiasm the Gospel of Love and the Gospel of Life. Our Lady of Guadalupe, Star of the New Evangelization, pray for us! S. Joseph, custodian of the life of the Womb of the Blessed Mother, pray for us!