From Mexico with Love: The Pilgrims’ Destination

The Story of Guadalupe, Part 2 – The Pilgrims’ Destination
By guest blogger Emily K. Grieves
Click here to read Part 1: Following Faith

It is almost December 12, the high holy day of Our Lady of Guadalupe, and the pilgrimages have kicked into high gear. All along the highways leading toward Mexico City, pilgrims walk with little more than a bedroll and an image of Guadalupe strapped to their backs. Long lines of pilgrims on bicycles pedal along the bumpy shoulder of the road, a lumbering truck leading the way like a guardian and plucking up both the tired and the flat tires. The pilgrims rely on the charity of others for food and water. If they walk in groups, they bear a banner with an embroidered Virgin image to lead them and keep them united. If they walk alone, their thoughts are between themselves and the rocks on the road, praying in penance or gratitude, making promises, asking favors, sending all their heart’s burdens and love to their holy Mother with every step. As they pass through villages on their way, kind neighbors step out into the street to hand out cups of juice or sandwiches, to cross themselves, to wave.

On December 11, the pilgrimages begin in earnest, as people push their endurance to reach Guadalupe’s home at the Basilica in Mexico City by the time the clock strikes midnight, ringing in Her “birthday” as millions sing “Las Mañanitas” to Her, to receive Her special blessings, deliver their petitions, and pour out their hearts in thanks to Her. Pilgrims walk through the night along the dangerous edges of freeways, or make their way on rickety bicycles, flowers and balloons tied into the spokes. If they battled the scorching heat all day, now they shiver in the cold darkness, but keep on walking to the company of glittering stars shining from the crisp night sky. Pilgrims reach Her with blistered and battered feet, and still push their way through massive crowds to line up and wait, inching forward into the Basilica on their knees, holding their images up over their heads and bowing down, touching foreheads to the cool tile floor in front of Her.

I once had the amazing fortune of being gifted a rare ticket to midnight mass at the Basilica for the fiesta. I sat front and center, basking in the flow of Her energy, the glow of Her image, and listened to Mexico’s finest musicians and artists sing Her love songs, dance and recite poetry, all dedicated with bursting heart to Her. I was awestruck by the infinite stream of people crawling on their knees in front of Her. I was blown away by the passion with which people expressed their love for Her, weeping as they sang to Her and blew Her kisses. Tears streamed down my own face to witness so much love. People gave everything to Her, all their sweat and blood surely, but also all their hopes and dreams, trusting in Her to fulfill them, and all their guilt and darkness, trusting in Her to forgive them. She is the Mother, after all, She who asks the people “Am I not right here who am your Mother?” People who may have spent a year bereft and downtrodden can come to Her bosom on this day and remember again that She was always there, never more than an embrace away. She tells us that we are always “in the fold of Her garment.” She told the people that She is the Mother of Mexico, but She further declares Herself the Mother of all people from all lands who call to Her, who implore Her for blessings, assuring us that She always has been and always will be with us.

Many pilgrims walking the long path to the Basilica are following a mandate in the tradition of Juan Diego. Many have called out to their Mother during the year and feel they have received a command from Her to make this journey. If a prayer was answered by Her, they must make the pilgrimage to give thanks in person – if they don’t answer Her calling, they will feel out of integrity with Her and their own soul. It is only right to go deliver gratitude in person to the Mother who answered your prayers. It is kind of like a cosmic energy exchange, and has its roots in traditions older than Spanish-introduced Catholicism. Even Pope John Paul II acknowledged that Mexicans are more Guadalupan than Catholic, and I think his recognition of it in part led to their mutual love for each other. Remember the brief synopsis of Guadalupe that I gave in Part I of this story? How did the appearance of Guadalupe save the indigenous people? Why did they all convert suddenly to Catholicism when She appeared, after 10 years of fierce resistance? Because they recognized their Mother in Her. They called Her (and still do) Tonantzin, “Revered Mother.”

Both Her story and Her image gave the people reference points to which they could relate, hidden symbols from their own cosmology. They could convert to the new religion with their minds at ease, because now their beliefs were hidden in plain view and would not be forgotten – to those in the know, their beliefs were preserved between the lines in the Her official story written in the indigenous Nahuatl language, and they were preserved in the very folds of her robes as shown on the tilma. The Sun. The Moon. Heaven on Earth. The Four-petaled Flower symbolizing Life gleams in gold like a beacon from the center of Her pregnant belly.

She gives us an invitation in Her story, a very important one. When She appears the first time to Juan Diego, he recognizes immediately who She is, and, establishing what reality or what dream he finds himself in, He asks “Is this the Heaven Earth Place?” Implicit in that question is the real possibility of finding oneself in a place that is heaven on earth, of dreaming a dream where heaven and earth are unified, a dream that has been offered by messiahs from Christ to Quetzalcoatl and surely beyond. In one version of the story, She gives Her name in Nahuatl to Juan Diego’s uncle Juan Bernardino as She cures him of the plague. She names Herself “Tecuauhtlacuepeuh” (from which the Spanish heard “Guadalupe,” hence her name as we know it today), and one translation of this name is as “She Who Comes Flying from the Regions of Light like an Eagle of Fire.” She comes to earth from heaven bringing us light.

The promise of finding or creating heaven on earth is at the end of every pilgrim’s path. While most pilgrims are simple people with great devotion, and many are likely unaware of the deeper mystical opportunities offered by the path to Guadalupe, the matrix of Her spirituality is open to anyone paying attention and asking and praying in deeper ways. I have often seen the most humble indigenous people avoiding crowds and going straight to secret places of power within the Basilica, speaking prayers in dialects, and I wonder if they are the last initiates of long-forgotten rites, the carriers of the instructions left from old times, those who remember the true rewards promised to the pilgrim.

I was blessed by the sudden opportunity to visit the Basilica again this past Saturday with a group of Americans, to go on a pilgrimage of our own. We wandered the crowded grounds amidst grubby exhausted bikers all the way from Chiapas chugging back liters of water. Tired families camped out on blankets. Pretty little girls in their finest white lace and babies in frilly dresses got ready for first communions and baptisms. Children in traditional Mexican costume skipped and pranced through open church doors. The families observed us with interest and amusement, curious about the gringos ascending the hill with such intention, but respecting us as fellow pilgrims. We prayed with our candles and released our fears and gave our thanks. When we came to the little church of the Indios, where Juan Diego cared for the tilma until his death in a simple hermitage, I inched my way into the crowd and heard the priest giving his sermon to the multitude, saying “You experience great hardship on your pilgrimage, walking many kilometers, arriving sunburned and blistered and tired, and yet you come with joy and love in your hearts. I ask you this question: Why do you do this only once a year? Why do you not walk through your hardships every day with joy and love in your heart?” The crowd listened with rapt attention as I took away this lesson from Juan Diego’s home. I thought about the priest’s message for a long time afterward. What if we walked through every day as if on a pilgrimage? To move through difficulties with love and joy would surely help us dream ourselves into the “Heaven Earth Place.”

What does it mean to go on a pilgrimage? To journey often long distances to visit a shrine or sacred place of great importance to one’s faith. To follow an urge to walk in one’s ancestors’ footsteps. To push oneself physically in order to break open spiritually. To dedicate a great amount of energy toward the object of devotion of one’s soul. A pilgrimage is arduous and challenging, but the pilgrim is willing to confront hardship or even danger as a way of overcoming fear, as a way of passing a test of faith. The test of faith cracks the spirit open to new possibilities, to new dreams, the dream of heaven on earth. I thought about the words of the priest from Juan Diego’s church, and I realized that life itself is a pilgrimage. We walk through the days of our lives searching for union with the divine, the sacred destination of life’s quest, and we encounter much hardship along the way. But if we persist, walking the path with love and joy, we reach our destination. On any pilgrimage, the destination is never really about the physical place but the energy associated with it and the way the energy uplifts us. It is the very way in which we make the pilgrimage that allows us to reach the destination. If we cannot walk the path to the Basilica this year, may we walk our every day with love and joy.

Have you ever felt called to go on a pilgrimage? Can you imagine moving through your own life as if on a pilgrimage? What is the sacred destination of your own life?

Emily K. Grieves is an artist and healer dedicated to helping people find connections to the sacred in their lives. She explores symbolism, mythology, and ritual in her artwork, drawing inspiration from the celebrations and mysteries of Life. She has also dedicated herself to the healing arts as a practitioner of shamanism and hands-on healing energy work for over 10 years. She lives with her family in Teotihuacan, Mexico, where she has painted murals in the Dreaming House, and where she helps lead groups into the transformative energies of the pyramids. To learn more, visit www.livingwithpyramids.blogspot.coand www.thedreaminghousemx.com.

Reference: The Aztec Virgin, The Secret Mystical Tradition of Our Lady of Guadalupe, by John Mini, Copyright 2000, Trans-Hyperborean Institute of Science Publishing)

Image #1: “La Ofrenda,” The Basilica of Guadalupe, Mexico City.
Image #2: “Juan Diego,” The Basilica of Guadalupe, Mexico City.

UPCOMING RETREAT
Join Emily Grieves and Annie Fuller for The Healers Journey to Teotihuacan and the Basilica of Guadalupe Feb. 16-23, 2011. This will be unforgettable experience of shamanic journeying and healing in one of the world’s greatest power places. See www.fullcirclespiritualhealing.com for more information.

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