The vision of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Oklahoma

On Dec. 11, the day before the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, I blessed a beautiful bronze statue of Our Lady atop our replica of Tepeyac Hill on the grounds of the Blessed Stanley Rother Shrine. This was the first public event at the shrine, and it was open to the public. 

While the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe is well-known in Oklahoma, not everyone may know the story behind her appearance to Juan Diego. 

Seven years before the pilgrims paddled ashore on our east coast, priests from Mexico City crossed the Red River to establish their foothold amid the Bois d’Arc and the cedar of Kiamichi Country in the place later to be known as Oklahoma. 

From the time of Cortez’s first footfall at Vera Cruz, throughout the history of North American exploration, the Spanish missionary effort spilled through the Highlands of Central America, up the coast to the shadows of the Tetons, along the Cordillera of the Rockies, and then at its northeastern fork, onto the plains into what would become Oklahoma. The success of the Spanish evangelization effort is stunning in its accomplishment. 

The central current of this missionary energy was inspired by the apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Here is what happened.

In 1531, at Tepeyac Hill just north of Mexico City, Juan Diego, who was an Aztec by culture and language and a Catholic by belief and conviction, encountered a young woman calling herself “the Mother of God” and the “Virgin of Guadalupe.” 

She entrusted him with a message for the local bishop, asking that a church be built there. With some trepidation, Juan Diego hurried off to inform the bishop and urge him to grant the young woman’s request. 

After several failed attempts to convince him, the bishop was ultimately convinced of the truth of Juan Diego’s report by the miraculous image of Our Lady of Guadalupe that had appeared on Juan Diego’s cape, his tilma. That tilma now hangs in the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City. When the astonished bishop saw what had been entrusted to Juan Diego, and then to the Church, he understood: there was something new happening. 

This encounter was an expression of a divine purpose on this hilltop in Mexico. Juan Diego saw the young woman, clothed with the sun, speaking to him in his own language, surrounded by the symbols and clothed in the images of his native place. When he saw, he understood. The message of the Gospel and the story of God’s love was directed at him and at his people. 

It was not merely a suggestion to give to the bishop; it was a vision of a new world – God’s promise to the people of Mexico spoken in the language of their heart and by way of the depths of their art. The apparition of the Lady of Guadalupe was a brief glimpse of the seed of God’s will coming to flower in the soil and the air of Mexico. 

Quickly, the bishop understood that the church to be built was more than just a chapel on Tepeyac. The church under construction was the gift of salvation offered to all who were in this land. Through image and art, through the intricacies of language and poetry, the Gospel message of Christ took root and began to flourish on this continent. 

That was the message of Guadalupe; the mission of Juan Diego. It was the message that caused the evangelization of Mexico to rush into full current and overspill into North and South America. 

Our Lady’s message of salvation through her divine Son fills the Church of Oklahoma today. In the gift of those who have come to us from Mexico, we have a renewed awareness of the mission of Guadalupe. The replica of Tepeyac and its bronze images of Our Lady and Saint Juan Diego at the Blessed Stanley Rother Shrine are a reminder that this vision encompasses us too. 

God is at work in our place and in our time. If we pause to listen, we can hear it: we are to build the Church, here.