12/9/2009 – Homily for the memorial of Juan Diego – Isaiah 48:17-19

12/9/2011 – Juan Diego – Isaiah 48:17-19;

       Sometimes God presents us with situations or tasks that seem to be just about impossible – we might not know how we'll ever get through them.  Imagine the task that was calling the prophet Isaiah.  He was called to provide hope to the people of Israel in the midst of gloom & doubt: to announce to those in exile in Babylon that God was on his way to deliver them. We hear Isaiah telling the people that God, the creator of this vast universe & all that is in it, has the power to restore & renew Israel. What a tough message to bring in the midst of such misery: the people probably doubted that God had any power at all. How could the Israelites see themselves as a chosen people when they were demoralized & in exile?

       And we can imagine the context in which Juan Diego found himself as well.  In 1519, Hernan Cortes & the Spanish conquistadors had invaded the Aztec empire, declaring their victory over the native population in 1521.  We can only imagine how devastated the natives were at that time.  Just 10 years later, in 1531, a 57 year-old native Mexican man named Juan Diego was making the 15-mile trek to attend mass.  A woman's voice called out to him in the midst of beautiful music from atop Tepeyac Hill; thus started the chain of events that led to the apparitions of Our Lady of Guadalupe.  Juan Diego is said to have told the Virgin Mary in his humility: “I am a nobody.  I am a small rope, a tiny ladder, the tail end, a leaf.”  Yet God chose Juan Diego for a special task. Thanks to him, Our Lady of Guadalupe is one of the 7 confirmed apparitions of the Virgin Mary validated by the Catholic Church. 

       Even today, Our Lady of Guadalupe is the image of hope & liberation in the Mexican & Latin American psyche.  Go through a poor Mexican American neighborhood in Los Angeles & you will see the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe everywhere. The image that Juan Diego brought into the world has so much meaning on so many levels even for us today. 

       Today, let us look to Juan Diego & Our Lady of Guadalupe as examples of faith, speaking out to us from a time & place so different from modern America, but the message they bring to us still resonates so clearly today.