HOUSTON (CNS) ─ When Mercedes Juarez moved from Mexico to Houston 52 years ago, only two Catholic churches in the city offered Mass in Spanish. She had to take two city buses, transferring from downtown to another bus to attend Our Lady of Guadalupe Church.
"We as immigrants leave behind our mother, father, brothers and sisters, but we do not leave behind our faith," Juarez said.
She and her husband, Daniel, were among about 1,000 others celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Virgen de Guadalupe Festival in downtown Houston Dec. 4.
In that spirit, Our Lady of Guadalupe Church in 1972 first began what has grown to become an archdiocesan-wide celebration of La Virgen de Guadalupe Festival.
The 50-year-old local event now draws more than 1,000 mostly Hispanic families and dancers dressed in colorful costumes, including feathered regalia and rattling beads. They swirl to Indigenous routines dancing to strong drumbeats and haunting calls blown from conch shells.
No matter what the origin, whether traditionally Chichimecas, Aztecas or Mexicas, the dancers are paying respect to Jesus and his mother Mary given as "the mother of us all," said Auxiliary Bishop Italo Dell'Oro of Galveston-Houston, who prayed over and blessed the procession.
The tradition honors when Juan Diego was stopped Dec. 9, 1531, on his way to Mass on a hill of Tepeyac near what is now Mexico City by the appearance of a brown-skinned woman bathed in light and speaking in his Indigenous tongue of Nahaut. She requested a church be built on that site.
At her bidding, he visited Bishop Juan de Zumarraga, who doubted the story. But Juan Diego saw Mary again Dec. 12, now the official feast day of Our Lady of Guadalupe. She arranged roses within his cloak picked from the hill where only cactus had been growing before. She told him to present the flowers as a gift to the bishop.
When Juan Diego returned to the bishop and opened his cloak or tilma, the roses tumbled out, and surprisingly, the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe was miraculously traced on the coat, which still exists today on display at the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe on that hill in Mexico City.
Realizing Juan Diego, who was canonized in 2002, was telling him the truth, the bishop began constructing the basilica, which led to massive conversions of Indigenous to Catholicism. The shrine in Mexico City remains one of the most visited Catholic pilgrimage sites in the world.
As the Houston celebration of this feast has grown, the procession route has changed from the co-cathedral to the George R. Brown Convention Center, said Juarez, a former president of the Association of Guadalupanas, which organizes the procession.
Cardinal Daniel N. DiNardo of Galveston-Houston and Bishop Dell'Oro celebrated the Mass at the convention center.
Priscella Marquez, current president of the association, said at least two of the participating dance groups had 150 dancers each and about 20 churches participated.
"The celebration for the 50th anniversary was so beautiful to return to downtown and see all the families coming together after COVID-19 caused it to be canceled in 2020," Marquez told the Texas Catholic Herald, newspaper of the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston.
Now the association works in conjunction with the archdiocesan Office of Hispanic Ministry, whose current director, Lazaro Contreras, said the event epitomizes both the diversity of all the Latin American countries and the unity of the local Hispanic community.
"As the patroness of the Americas, Our Lady of Guadalupe is a symbol of love and understanding, a unifying presence for all of us in the Americas," Contreras said. "This event helps families pass on the faith and cultural values to their young."
Even nine years before the 500th anniversary of the 1531 vision of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Houston Catholics are already planning how to celebrate even bigger and better, coordinating with officials in Mexico City, whose basilica events are televised worldwide.
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Zuñiga writes for the Texas Catholic Herald, newspaper of the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston.
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