The Miraculous Picture of Our Lady of Guadalupe

In our previous issue, we talked about the miraculous image of the Holy Shroud of Turin, which is most likely the cloth placed on the body of Jesus Christ at the time of his burial. Now we will talk about another amazing picture, that of Our Lady of Guadalupe, which appeared miraculously on the cloak of Juan Diego, a simple indigenous peasant, on the hill of Tepeyac near Mexico City on December 12, 1531. Today it is displayed in the Basilica of Guadalupe nearby, the most visited Catholic shrine in the world.

During a walk from his home village to Mexico City early on the morning of December 9, 1531, Juan Diego saw a vision of a young girl of fifteen or sixteen, surrounded by light, on the slopes of the Hill of Tepeyac. Speaking in the local language, Nahuatl, the Lady asked for a church to be built at that site in her honor and from her words Juan Diego recognized her as the Virgin Mary. Diego told his story to the Spanish bishop, Fray Juan de Zumarraga, who instructed him to return and ask the Lady for a miraculous sign to prove her claim. The Virgin told Juan Diego to gather some flowers from the top of Tepeyac Hill. It was winter and no flowers bloomed but on the hilltop Diego found flowers of every sort, and the Virgin herself arranged them in his tilma, or peasant cloak. When Juan Diego opened the cloak before Zumarraga the flowers fell to the floor, and in their place was the Virgin of Guadalupe, miraculously imprinted on the fabric.

Pope John Paul II visited the shrine three times: in the course of his first journey outside Italy as Pope from January 26-31, 1979, when he beatified Juan Diego on May 6, 1990 and again on July 31, 2002, when he canonized Juan Diego before a crowd of 12 million. On January 22, 1999, he proclaimed Our Lady of Guadalupe patron of the Americas.

Here is a text written by Andre Fernando Garcia on the amazing discoveries about the tilma of the Virgin of Guadalupe

1. Ophthalmalgic studies made on the eyes of Mary detected that when the eye is exposed to light, the retina contracts, and when the light is withdrawn, it returns to a dilated state, just as happens with a living eye.

2. The temperature of Juan Diego's tilma, made of a material that comes from fibers of the maguey cactus, maintains a constant temperature of 98.6 degrees, the same as that of a living human body.

3. One of the doctors who analyzed the tilma placed his stethoscope below the black band at Mary's waist and heard rhythmic beats at 115 pulses per minute, the same as that of a baby in the maternal womb.

4. No sign of paint has been discovered on the tilma. From a distance of 3-4 inches from the image, one can see only the maguey cactus fibers of the material: the colors disappear. Scientific studies have not been able to discover the origin of the coloration, nor the way the image was painted. They cannot detect vestiges of brush strokes or any other known painting technique. NASA scientists confirm that the paint material does not belong to any known element on earth.

5. When the material was examined under a laser ray, it was shown that there is no coloration on the front or the back of the cloth, and that the colors hover at a distance of 3/10th of a millimeter (1/100th of an inch) over the cloth, without touching it. The colors actually float above the surface of the tilma. Isn't that amazing?

6. The rough material of the tilma has a lifespan of no more than 20-30 years. Several centuries ago, a replica of the image was painted on an identical piece of maguey cloth, and it disintegrated after several decades. Nonetheless, during the almost 500 years of the miracle, the cloth with the image of Mary remains as strong as it was on the first day. Science cannot explain why the material has not disintegrated.

7. In the year 1791, muriatic acid accidentally spilled on the upper right side of the tilma. During the period of 30 days, without any special treatment, the affected fabric re-constituted itself miraculously.

8. The stars that appear on the Mantle of Mary reflect the exact configuration and positions that could be seen in the sky of Mexico on the day the miracle happened.

On the right side of the Virgin's mantle, the southern constellations are indicated: At the top are four stars that form part of the Orphiuchus constellation. Below it to the left, one finds Libra, and to its right, at what seems an arrow point, is the beginning of Scorpio. In the middle are the constellations of Lupus and to its left, an end point of Hydra. Further down, one can clearly see the Southern Cross; above it appears the slightly inclined square of the Centaurus constellation.

On the left side of the Virgin's mantle one sees the northern constellations: At her shoulder, a fragment of the stars of the Herdsman constellation; below it and to the left is the Great Bear. To its right is Berenice's Hair; below it, Hunting Dogs, and to its left, the Thuban, which is the brightest star of the Draco constellation. Below the two parallel stars (which still form part of the Big Bear), one finds stars from another pair of constellations: the Auriga and at the bottom, three stars of Taurus.

Thus, in their totality and proper places, the 46 most brilliant stars that can be seen on the horizon of the Valley of Mexico are identified.

9. In the year 1921, a man concealed a high power bomb in a flower arrangement, and placed it at the feet of the tilma. The explosion destroyed everything around it, except for the tilma, which remained intact.

10. Scientists discovered that the eyes of Mary have the three refractive characteristics of a human eye.

11. In the eyes of Mary (only about 1/3rd inch in size), miniscule human figures were discovered that no artist could have painted. The same scene is repeated in each eye. Using digital technology, the images in the eyes were enlarged many times, revealing that each eye reflected the figure of the Indian Juan Diego opening his tilma in front of Bishop Zumarraga. Do you know the size of this scene? One fourth of a millimeter (1/100th of an inch).

To close, let us look at three surprising facts:

1. In the Indian language, "Guadalupe" means to "crush the head of the serpent." It properly refers to Genesis 3:15: Mary, the conqueror of evil.

2. The image also depicts a detail from Apocalypse 12: "And a great sign appeared in Heaven. A woman clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet."

3. The Virgin wears a black band at her waist, which symbolizes pregnancy, to indicate that God wanted Jesus to be born in the three Americas, in the heart of each American.

"While I live I will praise the Lord: I will sing praise unto my God while I have any being" (Ps 146:2).

All of these explanations have the single purpose of demonstrating to you that the Virgin will be with you always, whenever you need her, that she will never abandon you, and that you will always be her special son or daughter.

Never forget the words she spoke to Juan Diego: "My little child, the smallest of all, let nothing afflict you. Do you not know that you are in my lap? Am I not here, I, who am your mother?"