In the real, unadulterated depiction of the Blessed Mother on
the Guadalupe tilma, she is about eight-and-a-half months pregnant. That’s
right, since her liturgical due date was about two weeks after her image
appeared on St. Juan Diego’s cloak in 1531.
You don’t see
many images of Mary in which she is pregnant. She was, you know. It’s in Luke.
But when she appears in approved statues and paintings, her appearance more
often implies the virginal and leaves out maternity. Additionally, when I see
them I think of the greeting that drives my Jewish friends up a wall: “But you
don’t look
Jewish.” Well, she wouldn’t if the model was a Renaissance painter’s
mistress, which so many of the models were, would she?
In many
unauthorized copies of the Guadalupe tilma, she gets Nordic coloring. They also
lift her head as if the humble tilt she showed to Juan Diego ill-befits a queen
of heaven, who should look like Wonder Woman when she is eclipsing – as she is
on the tilma – the sun god.
But that is
not how she presented herself.
What is on Juan
Diego’s cloak is not a painting. The tilma is made from fiber that lasts no
more than 20 years when artists try to copy the image on the identical kind of
material and make what one enthusiastic Milwaukeean called a “genuine replica.”
The tilma is going on 500 years. Lots of other things about it aren’t explained
either.
I have never
seen a picture of Mary up to her elbows in dough with a rolling pin in her
hands. The title would be Mary, Maker of Bread, and that’s symbolism that just
wouldn’t quit. It would probably give the vapors to the keepers of that
distinctly Catholic idea that Mary was a virgin mother without ever being
pregnant or breaking a sweat. (I also don’t believe that a Jewish mother undergoing
what she went through was meek and mild as a dove.)
I don’t think
the standard, authorized Catholic image of Mary is very biblical or true to
life. More importantly, we have the evidence of the tilma that neither does its
subject.
Update: I had an October date on top. Maybe confusingnmy birthday month with the one we are in. Or maybe just another senior moment. Anyway Deacon Jim gets credit for me getting the headline right.
Second update: A nice piece on interpreting Our Lady of Guadalupe,by Timothy Matovina, popped up on the Commonweal Website: https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/edges-empire
Update: I had an October date on top. Maybe confusingnmy birthday month with the one we are in. Or maybe just another senior moment. Anyway Deacon Jim gets credit for me getting the headline right.
Second update: A nice piece on interpreting Our Lady of Guadalupe,by Timothy Matovina, popped up on the Commonweal Website: https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/edges-empire
Tom, the headline should be Dec 12, I think?
ReplyDeleteI have the Renaissance Mary burned into my mental picture. I'm ok praying by one in our parish church (we have at least three or four images of her in and around the church, none resembling the Guadalupe image).
That Pachamama image from the Amazon Synod sounds closer to the Guadalupe image than the statues in my church are.
Jim, Yes. I had better fix that.
DeleteGuadalupe is my favorite Marian apparition. Because of what it is and what it means, but also because of what Mary doesn't do. She doesn't scare a child into nightmares, as she reportedly did at Fatima with visions of sinners being plunged into a fiery lake. Or tell children that one of their friends was going to be in purgatory until the Second Coming. Or say that Jesus is getting awfully mad at sinners, but she is trying to hold him back and give people another chance to get it together, but the day of reckoning is coming.
ReplyDeleteWhat she does do is send healing to Juan Diego's sick uncle. And send roses in December as a sign to the bishop. And give hope to a downtrodden people that God really does love them.
There are only three Marian apparitions that I can engage with or relate to at all, that would be Guadalupe, Lourdes, and Knock. And the one that happened to our friend Marv, but that's a whole other story. Guess I've got a recessive Baptist gene from my mom, some of the apparition lore used to drive her nuts.
Katherine, some of the apparition lore drives me nuts too. Even without any Baptist DNA at all.
ReplyDeleteJust out of curiosity - since some believe that Mary shows up all the time, all over the place - why doesn't her son ever appear to folk?
People go on pilgrimages to Marian shrines all over Europe, Latin America, probably to Africa and Asia too. She's constantly appearing to people, so they say, anyway.
But nobody ever goes on a Jesus pilgrimage anywhere except Israel. And it's not because he appeared there any time in the last 1950+ years after his ascension, it's because that's where he lived. No apparitions. Curious, is it not?
One hears more about the Marian appearances, but there have been some reported ones of Jesus. Such as to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque (the Sacred Heart devotion came from that) and to St. Faustina (Divine Mercy). And there was the vision of the Child Jesus to St. Anthony of Padua in which he held the holy Child. That one always kind of tugged at my heart. But I really don't know what to make of visions, at least most of them. I don't say they don't happen; I just don't think one can base faith on them.
DeleteSt. Julian of Norwich had visions of Jesus.
DeleteJesus appears all over the world every day in the Eucharist. That is more than enough for the faithful. If the skeptics think they need a conventional appearance, they should remember that he did appear that way when he came to his own, and they didn't receive them (Cf. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John et al).
DeleteMost of the apparition lore drives me nuts. I stay away from sacred sites -- including Rome, if anyone considers that sacred -- lest I be dis-edified by our more excitable faithful. I made an exception for Our Lady of Guadalupe and braved Mexico City air and traffic (each worse than the other) for her.
From the start, she was a scandal to the keepers of the Marian image that corresponds to the docile wife the unwed clergymen dream about. It took roses in December and the tilma to bring the bishop of Mexico City around, and imagine what it must have been like when he tried to explain that to his peer group! Had it not been for the "little people" Mary came to, the apparition would have died of neglect. But the unlearned and unwise saved it. I didn't know anything about it until Our Lady of Guadalupe showed up on the banners of the United Farmworkers when Cesar Chavez led them in the '60s. At 5 a.m. Thursday, throngs of Spanish-speaking parishioners around here will gather in churches and their parking lots for a celebration of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Every year.
There is not only the faith of her followers but, of course, the tilma itself. It survives now in a bulletproof glass vault (it was bombed early in the last century and survived), and that is a fact that must be dealt with. It is either the Virgin's version of herself, or a cosmic practical joke. I'm for the first conclusion.
I think Guadalupe is the real deal, too, because of the Tilma, and also because of the fruits that came from the apparition.
DeleteI don't know if it is true that the eyes of Mary in the image on the tilma reflect Juan Diego and the background. You'd probably have to have pretty high magnification to see it, and maybe an active imagination.
Our Lady of Knock is an apparition that sort of intrigues me. It is unique in that Mary didn't say one word. Also unique in that St. Joseph appeared with her. It seemed to be an instance of giving consolation and encouragement to poor and discouraged people.
And speaking of eye rolling apparition lore, the accounts of Maria of Agreda and Anne Catherine Emmerich go into multiple hundreds of pages, in excruciating detail. Not that I have put myself through the mortification of reading much of it.
Interesting that Pope Francis reinstated the feast of Our Lady of Loreto (celebrated today). It apparently is near and dear to his heart.
ReplyDeletePossibly old news to this crowd, but info on the iconography of the tilma's image in the context of Aztec culture here: https://www.catholiceducation.org/en/culture/catholic-contributions/the-tilma-s-symbolism.html
ReplyDeleteInterpreters seem divided about whether the BVM is indio or mestizo.
Others suggest that the angel below the virgin's figure has eagle's wings, another image of sacred power to the Aztecs.
Even a skeptic would have to concede that, if the tilma was man made, it is a very interesting artifact.
It's imagery is designed to reach indigenous people. At that time and place, it is doubtful that Church authorities would have known or cared enough about Aztec pagan beliefs to design such a thing. Generally missionaries were telling the locals that their gods were devils ready to snatch them to hell.
Usually religious art that blends old and new religious traditions is composed by populations in the midst of conversion. For instance, the Anglo-Saxon Frank's Casket features the visitation of the magi--three men in hoods and antlers--pagan priests/druids coming to acknowledge the true God. No Roman missionary would have thought that up, much less used runes around the border.
The image on the tilma, whether put there by heavenly intervention or human inspiration, is a subtle reminder to missionaries and Church authorities that God is willing to meet people where they are and to speak to them in ways they can understand. Even if the missionaries are not.
Also a subtle reminder to (would be) missionaries maybe not to pitch other people's art into the river.
DeleteI am a complete skeptic in apparitions, relics, and magical images on textiles. I wish I could believe, but I don't. However, I am not quite so cynical that can't see the human yearning to connect with the divine in them. It is a travesty when they are destroyed.
DeleteThis year I did what I've intended to do for the last few years and went to Las mananitas. Just got home. Las mananitas is a dawn serenade (in Mexico and a few other countries) to wake someone up on their birthday or saint's day. We were waking Our Lady of Guadalupe. About 350-400 souls at 5 a.m. -- at least as many male as female -- singing, clapping, shouting "Viva" and saying the rosary. A great time was had by all. They get bigger crowds at St. Juliana, which has a bigger Hispanic population and has been doing it longer, but we put on a good show for the feast. I understand there will be a mariachi band for the Mass tonight. (Has anyone noticed how much mariachi is like klezmer?)
ReplyDeleteNear the altar, they had erected life size mannequins of Juan Diego and Bishop Zummaraga at the moment the tilma opened and the roses hit the floor. Last year they set up a scale model of the basilica with a four-foot diameter.
I was wondering if there was a traditional hymn for the feast. Sounds like Las Mananitas would be it. I have heard it before as kind of the Mexican version of Happy Birthday. We sang Hail Holy Queen at Mass this morning, which was appropriate. But I imagine there are also other hymns traditional to the day.
DeleteFrom Rocco Palmo
ReplyDeleteBeginning US Catholicism’s largest annual gathering, period, video of tonight’s first of 11 Masses from Chicagoland’s Guadalupe Shrine at Des Plaines, which’ll draw over a quarter-million faithful through this feast (outdoor Mass at Midnight Central here