Lady of Guadalupe?

[aicirt]

Probably not. The Memorare was never part of Mass. We could talk about the decline of devotion to Our Lady which followed after Vatican II. It was certainly a different world before.

What was the reasoning re. the decline of devotion to Our Lady after Vat II?

Recently, I heard someone remark that if there isn’t a devotion to Our Lady in the Church shown by her statue or altar in a prominent area, there will be a lack of faith re. the Real Presence in the Eucharist.

 

[Filioque]

Last night on THE WORLD OVER, EWTN, it was reported changes have been made in the Mass. I was wondering if that will include the Memorare.

This thing about upsetting our Protestant brethren: how many have converted because we’ve changed the Mass, removed statues etc? How many come to a Mass? I’ve never understood this reasoning.

What have been reported as “Changes” are a more accurate translation from the Latin of the Current Missal.

In the rush to “update” and make the Mass more “relavent” many of the translators were less inspired by an accurate translation, as the newer theology they had been influenced by.

Credo, which in Latin is first person singular, (I Believe) was translated “We Believe” It will be corrected to reflect the Latin.

Et cum spiritu tuo. (And with your spirit) a very ancient response to the priest when he prays, “The Lord be with you” has been restored to the literal and ancient translation, rather than “And also with you”.

So it is less a “Change” in the Mass than a restoration of a correct translation.

The Rites of the Mass have never been the same everywhere. Eastern and Oriental Catholics have different rites. Even in the Western or Latin Church there were (and still are) places where the ritual differs, (Mozarabic in Spain, Ambrosian in Milan Italy and others) What is most important is that whatever the rites that surround the Mass, any Mass approved by the Holy See confirs the same exact graces, and is the unbloody anamenis of the sacrifice of Jesus on Calvary. At every Mass, the prinicple celebrant is Jesus Himself.

 

[brotherhrolf]

I cannot explain the decline in devotion to Our Lady. All I can do is opine on that which went before Vatican II and that which came after. When the British attempted to invade New Orleans in 1815, the people of the city along with the Ursuline nuns invoked Our Lady of Prompt Succor. From the time I was a young boy to the time I was a young adult, we prayed for Our Lady of Prompt Succor’s intercession and then we stopped years after Hurricane Betsy. And then came Katrina and Rita. Here in Baton Rouge came Gustav. We have begun once again to pray for Our Lady’s intercession.

 

[Iamnotalone]

The Juan Diego canonization committee ignored presentations (including one from a Mexican Catholic prelate) which cast doubt that there even was a Juan Diego. But alas the deed is done, not much we can do about it now. The Juan Diego story is much like legends surrounding the scapular or the rosary, where, maybe 100 years after the fact, there will be a supernatural origin for it. I personally view the Guadalupe image as a pious painting that eventually developed an extraordinary story surrounding it, and which helped bring a lot of people into the Church and away from paganism, human sacrifice, and what not.

I’ve read that it is not a painting. Scientists have detected a tiny image of Juan Diego in the eye of Our Lady of Guadalupe, thus reflecting what she was seeing and impossible to paint. I also read that the stars on her cloak show the constellation of stars that was positioned exactly in that manner on that day in 1531. There are many books that I hope to read regarding this beautiful story and miracle.

 

[Iamnotalone]

Oops! I think I answered the wrong thread.

I don’t believe that this is a painting. I’ve read that an image of Juan Diego is reflected in the eye of Our Lady of Guadalupe, and impossible to paint. Her cloak also displays the constellation of stars just as they were positioned on that exact day in 1531. The paints and oils on the cloak cannot be matched to anything available at that time. I hope to read more on this miracle to find out the truth.

Lupe

 

[JW10631]

The image on the tilma is not a painting. A painting on the maguey cactus would have been most difficult at best and would have rotted away after less than 50 years.

There are sufficient resources on the Internet and in printed books to refute any idea that the Image of Our Lady is man made. I have one book written by Jody Brant Smith, a Protestant scientist from Pensacola, Florida who investigated the Image. In his words, the image in unexplainable.

Some things cannot be explained by science.

 

[franklinf]

The Juan Diego canonization committee ignored presentations (including one from a Mexican Catholic prelate) which cast doubt that there even was a Juan Diego. But alas the deed is done, not much we can do about it now. The Juan Diego story is much like legends surrounding the scapular or the rosary, where, maybe 100 years after the fact, there will be a supernatural origin for it. I personally view the Guadalupe image as a pious painting that eventually developed an extraordinary story surrounding it, and which helped bring a lot of people into the Church and away from paganism, human sacrifice, and what not.

And? You make it sound like supernatural origins are crazy. Are you saying Our Lady didn’t give St. Simon Stock the brown scapular?

 

[John_Larocque]

And? You make it sound like supernatural origins are crazy. Are you saying Our Lady didn’t give St. Simon Stock the brown scapular?

I am saying, no, I don’t believe that story. That doesn’t mean it’s not true, it just means I don’t believe it’s true. Besides, it’s a misleading theology. Wearing a cloth around your neck doesn’t guarantee Paradise. Frequenting the sacraments, following the commandments and leading a prayerful life are the keys to heaven. The 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia entry, authored by Herbert Thurston actually covers the skeptics side of the story in a fair way. (I’m a fan of Father Thurston, probably for many of the same reasons others are not…) Same goes with the Dominican rosary. The fact that the Catholic Church invented an entire theology so that people wouldn’t perceive the Brown Scapular as a ticket to heaven is evidence to me that in fact, that’s how a great many people did indeed approach the promise.

 

[John_Larocque]

I don’t always agree with Gary Wills - far from it, his theology is too liberal for me - but IMHO he’s right about Guadalupe.

In 1990 the pope beatified a man, Juan Diego, who seems never to have existed. And in 2002 that phantom was canonized. It was to him, supposedly, that the Virgin appeared in 1531, magically imprinting her image on his mantle, an image revered as Our Lady of Guadalupe. But people close to the date of the purported apparition - those with the best means of knowing about it and motives for recording it - are silent about this apparition. Even the first Mexican bishop, a known critic of novel images who was said, nevertheless, to have received and built a church for the miraculous cloak, left no record of doing so, though he provided bequests for his other foundations. Was the exception he made for a miraculous image too unimportant to be included in these other (some minor) provisions? The respected sixteenth-century historian Toribio de Montalinia, in a record that emphasized Mexican devotion to the Virgin, does not mention Juan Diego or his mantle. The Franciscan editor of his history calls this omission inexplicable. But no other sixteenth-century history of the country’s religion mentions it either.

The earliest reference to the apparition occurred in 1648, 117 years after its purported occurrence, in a highly wrought theological meditation by a Franciscan, Miguel Sanchez, who said he was relying on oral tradition since there was no prior written record of the apparition. This lack of earlier evidence was an embarrassment to those promoting the cult of Juan Diego, so a document was produced in 1649, a flowery account of the apparition written in the local language, Nahuatl, and supposedly composed shortly after the date (1548) when the phantom Juan Diego died. Outstanding experts on sixteenth-century Mexico have long treated this as a forgery - Juan Bautista Munoz in the eighteenth century, for instance, and Joaqin Garcia Icabalceta in the nineteenth century - and three modern specialists in Nahuatl have demonstrated that it depends on (and therefore post-dates) the 1643 work by Miguel Sanchez. Even the Cambridge historian, D. A. Brading, who is sympathetic to the symbolism of the Lady of Guadalupe, calls this last investigation “a devastating criticisms of the received linguistic and textual foundations of the tradition.”

Though the Virgin is supposed to have appeared to an illiterate Mexican peasant, the image on the cloth is wearing European clothes, and the image is a familiar one in European iconography, reflecting European theology (of the Immaculate Conception). The Virgin’s very title comes from a Marian shrine in Spain, Guadalupe, and contains sounds Nahuatl speakers could not make. The claim that the pigments are miraculous has long been abandoned, and those who say the image was formed supernaturally cannot explain amateur-painter faults in it - e.g. why Mary’s gown has arabesque patterns that do not follow its foldrs.

He cites several works from Stafford Poole and D. A. Brading in the appendix, and admits to having exchanged correspondence with Poole. According to Wills, “scholars respectfully addressing to Rome their measured criticism of the historical basis of the cult have been ignored.” He is referring to Poole and “Rome’s repeated refusals to respond to the critics’ objections.” We already know about the ignored 1982 art study (also cited by Joe Nickell) and there are additional references in links I have mentioned above to other Guadalupe-skeptics. Quite simply, they didn’t matter.

 

[Like]

I don’t always agree with Gary Wills - far from it, his theology is too liberal for me - but IMHO he’s right about Guadalupe.

He cites several works from Stafford Poole and D. A. Brading in the appendix, and admits to having exchanged correspondence with Poole. According to Wills, “scholars respectfully addressing to Rome their measured criticism of the historical basis of the cult have been ignored.” He is referring to Poole and “Rome’s repeated refusals to respond to the critics’ objections.” We already know about the ignored 1982 art study (also cited by Joe Nickell) and there are additional references in links I have mentioned above to other Guadalupe-skeptics. Quite simply, they didn’t matter.

You got that right!

Quite simply, they didn’t matter.

Our Lady of Guadalupe ‘completely beyond’ scientific explanation, says researcher.
catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=16789

So you believe Pope JP II canonized a fictional Aztec Indian? Please tell us just why JP II would have done such an evil deed!

Saint Juan Diego
A Model of Humility

sancta.org/juandiego.html

 

[JustaServant]

I cannot explain the decline in devotion to Our Lady. All I can do is opine on that which went before Vatican II and that which came after.

I find it very sad what liberal Catholics like John say. It gives more ammunition to our enemies.

 

[Like]

I find it very sad what liberal Catholics like John say. It gives more ammunition to our enemies.

Amen!

 

[Monica37]

A bit off topic, but for children, Tomie De Paola’s The Lady of Guadalupe is a good one to read to young Catholics to create a respect for The Blessed Mother. My son is 4 and he likes the story and can identify most all images of Her. We are in Texas so this image is the most familiar to him.