How Much Do We Value A Commitment To A People And Place?
Good Morning Friends,
Today, for Catholics, is the Feast Day of Our Lady of Guadalupe, and in places like Immokalee, with large Mexican populations, people gather together to go from home to home (twelve in all) reenacting Mary and Joseph’s search for a place to stay for the birth of Jesus. They also remember the story of Juan Diego, a Mexican peasant who became the first indigenous Catholic Saint from the Americas. He is said to have been granted an apparition of the Virgin Mary on four separate occasions in December 1531 at the hill outside but now well within metropolitan Mexico City. But people did not initially believe him. The beauty of today’s passages helps us understand and bring meaning to the Catholic celebration that tells of Mary’s appearance but also is a kind of invitation for our potential role in holy history as well. What is relevant for today’s devotional is the story line, for in it Mary assures Juan that proof of the advent would be provided. It comes in an image of the Virgin Mary that is said to have been impressed by a miracle as a pledge of the authenticity of the apparitions on Juan Diego’s cloak. Today that image is ubiquitous in places like Immokalee.
And that brings us to today’s question… How Much Do We Value A Commitment To A People And Place?
Daily Devotionals 