The Virgin Mary is said to have appeared as a dark-skinned woman to Juan Diego in December 1531, at Tepeyac, located near Mexico City. Her three appearances to Juan Diego, who was a poor Aztec Indian, were at a time when the Spaniards dominated Mexico.

Mary told Juan Diego to instruct the bishop to build a church on the site where the Aztecs previously worshiped. The bishop didn't believe Juan Diego's story and told him if Mary wanted a church she would have to provide a sign.

On his way back from the bishop's residence, Juan Diego avoided the hill, but Mary appeared to him again-this time wanting to know why Juan Diego was avoiding her. He said the bishop had insisted on a sign.

Mary instructed Juan Diego to return to the hill to pick roses, an odd request since roses do not bloom there in December. Juan Diego made his way to the hill, found the roses, and gathered them up in his cloak. He returned to the bishop and when he unwrapped his garment, the roses spilled onto the floor and the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe was imprinted on his tilma. The bishop recognized the sign and immediately had a church built upon the site.

Scholar Antonio Valeriano recorded the story of this event around the middle of the sixteenth century, in Nahuatl, the Aztec language, and it is from his book that the story has endured.

Our Lady of Guadalupe has long been the patron saint of the Americas, but it was only a year ago that Juan Diego joined her in sainthood.

Juan Diego was beatified in 1990 - the last step before sainthood - because the apparition of the Virgin to him qualified as a miracle. But he needed one more miracle to become a saint. That came when a young Mexican suffered massive head injuries after jumping out of a window in 1990. His rapid recovery, after his mother prayed to Juan Diego, stunned his doctor. In 1998, the Vatican accepted the cure as a miracle, and in July, 2002, Juan Diego achieved sainthood.

Her garments were shining like the sun; the cliff where she rested her feet, pierced with glitter, resembling an anklet of precious stones, and the earth sparkled like the rainbow. The mezquites, nopales, and other different weeds, which grow there, appeared like emeralds, their foliage like turquoise, and their branches and thorns glistened like gold. He bowed before her and heard her word, tender and courteous, like someone who charms and steems you highly.

Valeriano explains that Mary told Juan a temple must be erected on that spot so that she could give 'love, compassion, help and protection to all the inhabitants in this land'. She then instructed Juan Diego to go to the palace of the bishop of Mexico [City] and accurately relate all she had said.

Juan did as she asked and went to the bishop's palace, and after a very long wait the bishop allowed his admission. Upon hearing Juan Diego's story the bishop said he would give the matter thought. When Juan Diego returned to the spot of the apparition and told the Lady that he had done as she asked, but he felt the bishop did not believe him.

The Lady asked him to return to the bishop in the morning and repeat her request with more urgency. Juan Diego begged her to chose another person, someone the bishop might respect and believe. "I am a nobody" he said. She replied that he should understand he would go in her name.

Juan Diego again went to the bishop, who listened attentively to all Diego said, and then said he must have a sign, something to show that Diego spoke the truth. Juan returned to the Lady and relayed the bishop's request for a sign. She told him to return to the site in the morning and she would give him a sign.

However Juan Diego did not return the next morning because his uncle fell gravely ill. He stayed all day with his uncle, By nightfall his uncle asked him to go to Tlatilolco [Mexico City] and summon a priest in the morning as he was certain it was time for him to die.

Before dawn Juan Diego left to seek a priest, when he neared the hill where the previous apparitions had occurred the Llady approached him. Diego explained his plight -that he must hurry for a priest and could not fulfil her request to visit the bishop until the next morning. Valeriano writes "After hearing Juan Diego's chat, the Most Holy Virgin answered 'Let not your heart be disturbed. Do not fear that sickness, nor any other sickness or anguish. Am I not here, who is your Mother? Are you not under my protection? Am I not your health? Are you not happily within my fold? What else do you wish? Do not grieve nor be disturbed by anything. Do not be afflicted by the illness of your uncle, who wil not die now of it. Be assured that he is now cured.'

The Lady then ordered Diego to climb to the top of the hill and cut flowers he would find there and bring them to her. Diego was amazed when to find many rosas de Castilla blooming in the dead of winter. He gathered them all and carefully placed them in his tilma. (A tilma is the garment Aztec Indians wore against the cold, a blanket-like garment woven out of cactus. (check this)

"With great care he bore his tilma, to the bishop in Mexico City, being careful that nothing would slip from his hand."

When he reached the bishop's palace and again, after a very long wait saw the bishop, he explained the Lady's request once more, telling the bishop of the exquisite rosas de Castilla the Lady had provided as a sign. When he unfolded his tilma to show the bishop the flowers fell to the floor and there appeared the drawing of the now-famous precious Image of the ever-virgin Holy Mary-the same image that is on the cloth today.

"The bishop and his court fell to their knees, then asked to accompany Juan Diego to see the spot where the Lady from Heaven wanted her temple built. After taking the biship to the spot Juan Diego begged to be excused to see his uncle Juan Bernardino. The bishop and his entourage accompanied Juan Diego to his uncle's home and saw him fully recovered. The uncle then told of an apparition the Lady made to him when he was cured, and that the Lady told him to reveal to the bishop, who would come to his house, that he had seen her, the miraculous manner in which she had cured him, and that she should properly be named and known as the blessed Image, the ever-virgin Holy Mary of Guadalupe.

The bishop transferred the sacred Image of the lady from heaven to the main church so that the people would see and admire her blessed Image.

Within five years of this apparition, six million Aztecs had converted to Catholicism. Since the time the tilma was impressed with a picture of Mary, it has been subject to a variety of environmental hazards, including smoke from fires and candles, water from floods and torrential downpours, and, in 1921, a bomb which was planted by anti-clerical forces on an alter under it. Mysteriously, it has never sustained damage. The cactus cloth has survived four centuries and the image of the Lady of Guadalupe remains clear. It can be seen today in a shrine built to house worshippers. It is by far the most popular religious pilgrimage site in the Western Hemisphere.

Pope John Paul II visited the spotof the appariation in 2002, and officially cannonized Juan Diego during his visit.

Each year before sunrise on Dec. 12, in Catholic churches across the nation, tens of thousands Hispanics fill up the pews and aisles to honor La Virgin de Guadalupe. This feast day commemorates the Virgin Mary's appearance to Juan Diego in 1531 on a hill outside Mexico City. It is the largest annual religious celebration in the Hispanic culture. In the Santa Ynez Valley the Feast of Our Lady Of Guadalupe celebration begins with a pre-dawn procession, starting at 5th and Mission at 3:30 a.m. Just as Juan Diego traveled by foot before dawn near Mexico City so long ago, our Hispanic community rises before dawn to celebrate the Vision of Our Lady of Guadalupe. The procession proceeds from 5th Street to the outdoor shrine to Our Lady of Guadalupe at the Mission, where songs of praise are sung, accompanied by Mariachis. Although cold, candles help warm the hands while voices lift in song. At 5:30 a.m. a Mass in Spanish celebrates the Vision of Our Lady-and presents all the elements of that vision. After Mass, sweet breads, chocolate, coffee and menudo are served in the parish hall, accompanied by more Mariachi music. Anyone wishing to take part in this cultural event is welcome. (Contact Susan at OMSI at 688-4815 for details.)