Hey Deacon

In October of 2022, I had the privilege to lead seven other pilgrims to Mexico City to visit the shrine and Basilica of Our Lady of Gaudalupe. It was one of my personal bucket list items. My uncle, Fr. Mason Vaughn, in 1950, was a newly ordained priest. Before starting his first parish assignment, he traveled to the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe and celebrated Mass. My dad, a senior in high school, traveled with him was his altar server. Below is the history behind the feast day.

On December 9, 1531, barely 10 years after the Spanish conquest of the Aztecs, Our Lady appeared to a native peasant named Juan Diego while he was crossing Tepeyac Hill, outside what is today Mexico City. After telling Juan that she was the “mother of the true God,” she told him that she wanted a church to be built there in her honor. Juan Diego approached the bishop of the new diocese of Mexico, Fray Juan de Zumárraga, asking for a church to be built. Without any proof, the bishop did not believe him. The Blessed Virgin then appeared again to Juan Diego, asking him to approach the bishop again. Juan obeyed and this time the bishop requested a miraculous sign to prove his story. Our Lady appeared a third time to Juan on December 10, and said she would provide a miracle the next day.

However, on December 11, Juan Diego’s uncle became seriously ill, and he took care of him instead of meeting the Blessed Virgin. When his uncle, Juan Bernardino, appeared to be in his final hours on the early morning of December 12, Juan left the house to find a priest. Believing that he could avoid seeing the Blessed Virgin, he took another route. However, not to be outsmarted, she still appeared to him.

The Blessed Virgin asked where he was going, and he explained that his uncle was ill. In response to Juan’s lack of understanding of her great love for him, the Blessed Virgin asked him, “Am I not here, I who am your mother?" She then told him that his uncle had, in fact, recovered. Then Our Lady asked Juan to collect some flowers from Tepeyac Hill, which is usually barren in December. He found Spanish Castilian roses blooming, which are not native to Mexico. The Blessed Mother arranged the roses in Juan Diego’s tilma before he proceeded to the bishop yet again. Upon opening his tilma before the bishop and other witnesses, the miraculous image of Our Lady of Guadalupe was revealed as the roses fell to the ground. The following day, Juan Diego returned to his uncle and found him completely recovered, as the Blessed Virgin had said. Juan Bernadino reported that Mary had appeared to him also and requested to be known under the title of “Guadalupe.”

Within seven years of this apparition, nine million accepted the Catholic faith. This amounts to an average of over 3000 people a day, every day for these seven years. This is the same daily number who were converted on Pentecost, as recorded in Acts 2:41. Over 20 million people visit the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe each year, now situated on the very same hill on which she appeared. It is the most visited Catholic shrine in the world. In 1990, Pope Saint John Paul II visited Mexico and beatified Juan Diego. 10 years later, in the year 2000, he was declared a Saint.


Author: Deacon Dan Vaughn