Posted on 03/09/2007 9:16:41 AM PST by freedomdefender
"Am I not here, I who am your Mother? Are you not under my shadow and protection?" The Blessed Virgin Mary spoke these words to an Indian merchant on December 12, 1531, during the last of her several appearances to him. It is quite probable that one of the consequences of these apparitions was the prevention of an armed revolt of the Mexican Indian population against their Spanish conquerors. Another was the greatest mass conversion to Christianity in the history of the Church.
Today, we are being told that there is a "clash of civilizations" between the Western and Islamic worlds. Few people, however, are asking if the Mother of God can help prevent this clash from becoming cataclysmic. Likewise few people know that the Koran -- yes, the Koran -- speaks of her in this manner: "The angels said O Mary, God has chosen and purifies you.... He has chosen you above the women of the world."
It has been nearly 500 years since Mary appeared to Juan Diego and his uncle Juan Bernardino in a series of five apparitions and left an image of herself on Juan Diego's tilma, in what might rightly be called history's greatest ongoing miracle. Many things have changed since December 12, 1531. The "age of faith," which contributed to the Spanish conquest of the New World, has essentially disappeared from the Western world. Ironically, if it exists at all, it is much more likely to be found in the Islamic world, albeit sometimes in a violent, corrupted, and even criminal form. Still, there are some lessons from the apparitions that can be very relevant to the problems of today, including the "clash of civilizations."
When Mary appeared to Juan Diego on Tepeyac Hill in 1531, it had been a little over 10 years since Spanish explorer Hernán Cortés, his fellow conquistadores, and their Indian allies conquered the Aztec empire. Like Isabella, the great Catholic Queen of Spain, Cortés and many of the conquistadores did have a desire to convert the native populations they subdued to the Catholic Faith. For Isabella, this was very important and a major reason she helped finance Christopher Columbus's first voyage to the New World in 1492. For many of the conquistadores, however, once they arrived in the New World, their concern for the spiritual welfare of the native populations seemed confined to the next world, and they acted like they wanted the natives to get there as soon as possible. The great distance between Spain and the New World greatly hampered the Spanish Crown's efforts to curb these abuses.
One thing the Crown did do to help alleviate their plight was to send Franciscan and Dominican missionaries to champion the Indians' cause and evangelize them in the Catholic Faith. Due to the abusive behavior of many conquistadores, however, converts to the Faith were small in numbers, and even these paltry few would be lost if an armed revolt by the Indians, which many feared was on the horizon, actually happened. There were nearly 1,000 Indians for every Spaniard, and because of the aforementioned treatment of the natives, the Spaniards were not likely to have many -- if any -- of the Indian allies that the Aztecs' practice of subjecting prisoners of war and others to human sacrifice had provided them during Cortés's conquest. Thus, there was a very good chance that the Spaniards could be defeated, if the armed revolt actually materialized. And there was also a very good chance that the triumphant Indian populations would attempt to wipe out every vestige of Spanish rule, including the Catholic Faith. This was the situation that existed in New Spain in 1531 when the Mother of God intervened. In addition to producing some of the most startling results in salvation history, her intervention provided future generations with much to reflect upon concerning not only its results but how she accomplished them.
Consider the man she chose to be the primary human instrument in this important mission. Juan Diego was a humble but prosperous merchant who, along with his recently deceased wife and uncle, Juan Bernardino, was among the relatively few Indians who had converted to Catholicism and devoutly practiced the Faith. In fact, he was on his way to receive further instruction in the Faith when Mary interrupted his journey on Tepeyac Hill and requested that he tell Bishop Juan de Zumárraga that she wanted a chapel built in her honor at that location. Juan had misgivings as to whether he was the appropriate messenger, particularly after Bishop Zumárraga told him he would take the matter into consideration and created the impression that he doubted that Mary had really appeared to him. Therefore, Juan requested Mary send another person, but Mary assured him that he was the right man for the job. And as events soon proved, Juan's ancestry, socioeconomic circumstances, ability to communicate, and, most importantly, personal piety confirmed the wisdom of her choice. Prior to his death in 1548, Juan told the remarkable story of how the Mother of God appeared to him and miraculously imprinted an image of herself on his tilma probably no less that 20,000 times. Next to the image itself, his retelling of these miraculous events led to the greatest mass conversion in the history of Christianity. Over eight million Indians converted to the Faith before the death of Juan Diego.
Of course, the image itself is the most remarkable thing about the Guadalupe apparitions story. It has been asserted that the Indians were greatly impacted by the image because Mary appeared dressed like an Indian princess. The garments she wore, however, were not the style of dress of 16th-century Mexican Indian women. They were the style of garments worn by Jewish maidens when Mary walked on this earth, and as those following the current events in the Middle East can testify, resemble the type of clothing still worn by many women in that area today. Because Mary appeared in the type of clothing she wore when she gave birth to and raised her divine Son, many believe that the face seen on the miraculous image is the same one Jesus, Joseph, and the Apostles saw 2,000 years ago.
Even though the style of clothing she wore may not have had any special significance to the native Indian population, the symbols on the clothing and her positioning on the image had enormous meaning for them. By standing on the moon and obscuring the sun's rays, she indicated that she was greater than any of the elements they worshiped as gods. But by folding her hands in prayer, she indicated that there was a God greater than herself. This same basic message was communicated in the symbolism contained in her clothing. After viewing the image, the Indians realized that they could now worship the one true God rather than the false gods they had been serving in various manners, including the barbaric practice of human sacrifice.
Mary may have also used the inability of the Spanish to correctly pronounce the languages of the Indians to unify both of these races in devotion to her. When she sent Juan Diego to Bishop Zumárraga with the sign requested by the Bishop to prove she was really appearing to Juan, she assured him that his critically ill uncle, Juan Bernardino, would be cured of his illness. She performed this healing in person and told Juan Bernardino the name she wished to be referred to in relation to these apparitions. To the Spanish, this name sounded like Guadalupe, a site in Spain of a famous Marian shrine associated with the Spanish reconquest of their nation from the Moors. Many of the Spanish associated with the exploration and conquest of the New World had made pilgrimages to this famous shrine. These individuals included Queen Isabella, Christopher Columbus, Hernán Cortés, and Bishop Zumárraga.
Although he was quite reluctant to accept the office of bishop in the most important city in New Spain, Juan de Zumárraga was a saintly Franciscan friar who possessed many qualities that were badly needed in the New World and also made him ideally suited for our Lady's plan. The original skepticism he manifested concerning whether Mary was really appearing to Juan Diego was an act of prudence the Church expects from someone in his position. Also prudent was the request he made concerning some sign to validate the reality of the apparitions. His great faith and piety was manifested in the penitential sorrow that he expressed when he saw the miraculous image imprinted on Juan Diego's tilma and the subsequent quick approval he gave for the requested chapel to be built. This chapel, the first of several that have housed the sacred image, was built in two weeks with both Indian and Spanish labor working together on the project.
For modern man, however, there is another aspect of Bishop Zumárraga's role in this drama that needs to be examined. The willingness of the Mother of God, the Queen of Heaven, to request, not order, the chapel be built demonstrates her respect for the magisterial or teaching office of the Church. Mary seems to be telling men of all ages that it is to the Magisterium of the Church that they must turn in order to discover the Truth and learn how to properly use their freedom. Her actions made these teachings of the Catechism come alive: "The pastoral duty of the Magisterium is aimed at seeing to it that the People of God abide in truth..." (#890), and "Personal conscience and reason should not be set in opposition to the moral law or Magisterium of the Church" (#2039).
In asking others to do what she did at Guadalupe and when she lived on earth, she was showing them what her divine Son meant when He said, "You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free" (Jn. 8:32). In Redemptoris Mater, Pope John Paul II wrote, "Mary is totally dependent upon God and completely directed towards him, and at the side of her Son, she is the perfect image of freedom and of the liberation of humanity and of the universe" (#37).
Those directing the current efforts to bridge the cultural differences between the West and Islam through the introduction of democracy and ill-defined notions of freedom should ponder the following words of the late Holy Father to be certain that the concept of freedom that they are trying to introduce will resonate in the Islamic world: "Patterned on God's freedom, man's freedom is not negated by his obedience to the divine law, indeed, only through this obedience does it abide in the truth and conform to human dignity" (Veritatis Splendor, #42), and "democracy is a 'system' and as such is a means and not an end. Its 'moral' value is not automatic, but depends on conformity to the moral law to which it, like every other form of human behavior, must be subject..." (Evangelium Vitae, #70).
Despite these words, Pope John Paul II recognized that the Western world has made more advances in the promotion of human rights than anywhere else. "This heightened sense of the dignity of the human person and of his or her uniqueness and of the respect due to the journey of conscience, certainly represents one of the positive achievements of the modern culture" (Veritatis Splendor, #31).
Nevertheless, in the West, this respect for personal conscience and individual uniqueness is often translated into a vision of moral autonomy, an autonomy lacking any reference to the truths of the moral law or the common good. Nothing better illustrates this crisis in Western thought and values than the positions being taken by many Western nations on women's and children's rights, particularly at international conferences. Often these nations are asserting in conjunction with sexual behavior and reproductive issues that, if women and at least adolescent children wish to engage in premarital, extramarital, or homosexual sex, there is nothing wrong with their behavior, if they have freely chosen to engage in it. Obviously, this notion of freedom conflicts with the teaching of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. It is also a prime example of how "freedom negates and destroys itself and becomes a factor leading to the destruction of others, when it no longer recognizes and respects its essential link with truth" (Evangelium Vitae, #19).
Islam means submission to the will of God, and any attempt to foist upon the Islamic world the idea that man should have the freedom to violate the moral law of God with impunity is a recipe for disaster.
Let us not forget that the Catechism recognizes the limitations of freedom. "The exercise of freedom does not imply a right to say or do everything" (#1740). The Virgin Mary understood this perfectly and always used her freedom to do God's will, which is why she is the most "perfect image of freedom." This is why she is not only the most revered woman in Christianity but also of Islam. There are actually more references to her in the Koran than the Bible.
Therefore, might Mary serve as the bridge between the Western and Islamic worlds? Actually, many Moslem women not only resemble our Lady in their style of dress but also in the practice of a virtue that Western women must once again embrace if Western civilization is going to endure, let alone expand. That virtue is chastity.
Many years ago, Archbishop Fulton Sheen noted the difficulties Christian missionaries were having in converting Moslems to the Faith. He proposed a solution to the problem: Fostering devotion to the Virgin Mary. In his book The World's First Love, he wrote, "It is our firm belief that the fears some entertain concerning the Moslems are not to be realized, but that Islam will eventually be converted to Christianity. This will not happen through the direct teaching of Christianity but through the summoning of the Moslems to a veneration of the Mother of God.... Because Moslems have a devotion to Mary, our missionaries should be satisfied merely to expand and develop that devotion with full realization that Our Lady will carry the Moslems the rest of the way to her Divine Son."
When and if such an effort is ever made is in the hands of God -- and sometimes the mysterious ways of Divine Providence are not ours to fathom. It certainly is not likely that on the night of December 12, 1531, either Juan Diego or Bishop Juan de Zumárraga had any idea that the miraculous events of the day would soon lead to the conversion of over eight million Mexican Indians to the Catholic Faith.
Only God knows whether a similar type of intervention is going to be required to prevent the "clash of civilizations" between the Western and Islamic worlds from threatening the continued existence of mankind.
We "poor banished children of Eve" should not only ask our Lady of Guadalupe to pray for us, but under one of her other titles, the Seat of Wisdom, grant us the guidance to use our freedom to seek the Truth. This is the only certain way of bringing peace to mankind.
This is much more appropriate in the Religion Forum, and I request that this be made a Catholic caucus item.
ping
Respectfully, I don't agree. It's about the clash of civilizations. That's what's on everybody's mind - it's a clash that underlies the war on terror.
If every mention of Islam and the Koran is "more appropriate for the Religion Forum," then most of our discussion of the WOT would be relgated to the Religion Forum
I'm just loathing the Catholic bashers showing up for this thread.
I think the mods are pretty good at keeping them in line.
This piece offers an interesting take and historical perspective on the clash of civilizations that I hadn't heard before.
I'm just loathing the Catholic bashers showing up for this thread.
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Is it Catholic bashing to suggest that the thread belongs in the religion forum? I don't understand your comment.
No Catholic bashing here. Count me a skeptic on most alleged apparitions, but if in fact Mary can engineer mass true conversions of muslims to the truth, then I say Amen.
bump
Coming to an oil slick or underpass stain near you just in time to save the world!
There were Marian apparitions at Zeitun, Egypt, over a Coptic church there. Muslims as well as Christians came to venerate.
http://www.zeitun-eg.org/stmaridx.htm
Mary does not operate autonomously from God. But if it were God's will that the Muslims should know Him, led through Mary to the Son, and through Him to God in His fullness - that would be a great blessing for our world.
Mrs VS
Complete un-biblical nonsense...That will send countless numbers of muzlims to Hell...
I guess if you guys can drink some BoonesFarm and let some guy in a robe convince you it's not only Blood, but God's blood, I suppose you can believe statues bleed and it's normal to see and talk to the ghost of Mary...
And you think Mary is going to carry the muzlim world to Jesus...
But they still won't become Christians...They'll just be muzlims that meet Jesus...
If your muzlims could meet Jesus the man, they would try to cut his head off...But when they DO meet Jesus/God/the Holy Spirit, their blood will run horse bridle deep...
www.catholicplanet.com
I continue to be amazed at those who chose to be the arbiters of what constitutes the miraculous. I think you might be a little less bold if you really understood what Jesus called the unforgiveable sin. I know you believe God is powerful enough to perform a miracle each and every time a Mass is said. Are you really so sure that He hasn't?
Yep
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