Our Lady of Guadalupe

 

 

Luke 1: 39=47 

Mary Visits Elizabeth

³⁹ At that time Mary got ready and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judea, ⁴⁰ where she entered Zechariah’s home and greeted Elizabeth. ⁴¹ When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. ⁴² In a loud voice she exclaimed: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! ⁴³ But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? ⁴⁴ As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. ⁴⁵ Blessed is she who has believed that the Lord would fulfill his promises to her!”

Mary’s Song

⁴⁶ And Mary said:

“My soul glorifies the Lord
⁴⁷     and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,

Today in Mexico, millions of people will gather at the huge Basilica outside of Mexico City to honor the apparition of Mary to Juan Diego as Our Lady of Guadalupe.  For twenty years missionaries had labored to convert the native population to Catholicism with little success  10 years after this apparition, most of the native population (9 million) had been baptized willingly and the devotion to Mary as Our Lady of Guadalupe is now stronger and more needed than ever.   Bishop Robert Barron states this directly and succinctly: "The challenge for us who honor her today is to join the same fight. We must announce to our culture today the truth of the God of Israel, the God of Jesus Christ, the God of nonviolence and forgiving love. And we ought, like La Morena, to be bearers of Jesus to a world that needs him more than ever."

Bro. Rene

.O God, Father of mercies, who placed your people under the singular protection of your Son's most holy Mother, grant that all who invoke the Blessed Virgin of Guadalupe, may seek with ever more lively faith the progress of peoples in the ways of justice and peace. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, forever and ever. Amen.