Introduction
Today, we begin our Nine-Month Novena to Our Lady of Guadalupe.
Our Lady of Guadalupe first appeared to Saint Juan Diego just before dawn on a Saturday morning, December 9, 1531. Although the home of Juan Diego was in Cuauhtitlán, his spiritual home was Tlatelolco, the place of his baptism and of his ongoing instruction in the Catholic faith. Our Lady favored with her apparition and chose as her messenger a humble Christian who was seeking to deepen his knowledge of the faith through instruction from the priest whom he identifies as an image of Christ alive for us in the Church.
When Our Lady began to speak with him, she immediately declared the truth of her being, of her relationship with God as Mother of God the Son Incarnate, and of her relationship with Juan Diego, as with all Christians. She declared:
Know, know for sure my dearest and youngest son, that I am truly the ever perfect Holy Virgin Mary, who has the honor to be Mother of the one true God for whom we all live, the Creator of people, the Lord of all around us and of what is close to us, the Lord of Heaven, the Lord of Earth (Nican Mopohua, no. 26).
What is primary for Our Lady in her relationship with Juan Diego and in his collaboration as her messenger is the truth that she is the Virgin Mother of God the Son Incarnate Who is the King of Heaven and Earth and Who alone is our salvation.
The first lesson which Our Lady of Guadalupe teaches us to equip us for today’s grave crisis is the inseparable unity of truth and love. We cannot truly love another person while also disregarding or betraying the truth which should inform every relationship. The fundamental approach to the crisis of the family, of society, and of the Church is the knowledge of truth and the practice of it with love.
