Celebrating Guadalupe, Sacred Icon of the People

It’s a cold December morning. The church is crowded to the max. It’s not often that I attend the Spanish Mass; it begins too early and I like to sleep. But it’s nice to be amid friendly brown faces: Mexican, Filipino, Salvadoran, in what was once a predominantly Anglo church.

Today’s Mass--replete with mariachis and Aztec dancers--to honor la Virgen de Guadalupe is about to begin, as I’m sure are other celebrations in her native Mexico, where legend claims la Virgen appeared to Juan Diego, an Indian, to ask that a church be established in her name.

Around me children wiggle in their seats; an old man stifles a yawn. Throughout my childhood, the Virgin of Guadalupe was a shadowy figure. Although our community of Pacoima was predominantly Mexican, no altar to Guadalupe graced our church. In his quest to Americanize us, our Anglo pastor directed our prayers to the fair Virgin Mary, Queen of the Americas. Guadalupe was too foreign. Were we not Americans?

My parents were not overly religious; no altars were found in our home. Neither did we pray the rosary at home as did other familias Catolicas--Catholic families.

My well-read father knew well Mexican history: el Porfiriato, la revolucion, los cristeros (the rebellion in the name of religion). Although he rarely attended Mass, he saw to it that we did. And although she tried, my mother could not make him join the Holy Name Society.

My friends and I preferred the Virgin Mary. Not so much because she was blond with blue eyes--although that was a factor--but because she understood English, the language we now prayed in. Guadalupe was Mexican; she understood only el Espanol, a language we had all but forgotten. We began to view la virgen Mexicana as a lesser deity, Dec. 12 as just another day.

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During the 1970s Chicano movement, mariachi Masses began to infiltrate Mexican barrio churches, a novelty that upset die-hard traditionalists still lamenting the end of the Latin Mass. Mariachis, folks insisted, were for fiestas, not la iglesia, the church. Nonetheless, with an influx of Latinos to California, it became fashionable to hire musicos--musicians--to sing at weddings and during Catholic feast days. Today, mariachi Masses honoring La Virgen de Guadalupe are common. Was not the Southwest once Mexico?

During the 1960s, Cesar Chavez and striking farm workers came together under the patronage of this most powerful icon. From the beginning of the United Farm Workers movement, the Virgin of Guadalupe--the personification of the indigenous mother--was associated with the oppressed. Them. Us. Would the farm workers have succeeded without her? In fact, Guadalupe is a favorite of Chicana feminists. Radical feminists, yet. Women who never attend church but identify with a brown (and powerful) woman.

Yolanda Lopez, a Bay-area artist, painted a series of images of la Virgen de Guadalupe that drew raves and criticism. “Guadalupe Running” shows the virgin in jogging shorts, her cape flying in the wind. She looks young, healthy and energetic, with enough strength to take on the mean bishop who refused to listen to Juan Diego.

Another painting is of Guadalupe at a sewing machine, stitching her cape. I find this powerfully political. Is not Guadalupe the patron saint of sweatshop workers?

When in 1984, Fem, Mexico’s feminist magazine, featured Lopez’s “Guadalupe Walking” on the cover of an issue that focused on Chicanas, the editor and publisher were threatened. How dare feminists portray the holy virgin in high heels? What lack of respect! Jesus, Maria y Jose! But today belt buckles, earrings and T-shirts with portraits of Guadalupe sell like hot cakes.

Recently, while at the swap meet, I overheard two women haggling over a jacket with an image of the virgin. The black leather coat cost $200. It sold to the highest bidder, a Tejana in Levi’s; it matched her cowboy boots. I could almost see her atop a wild mustang, Guadalupe hanging on for dear life.

The Virgin of Guadalupe brings together Latinos like no other cultural icon, except maybe Fernando Valenzuela, the baseball player, in his prime. She is as popular as tacos and salsa. Friends hang her picture next to those by Van Gogh and Pissarro. Chicana writer Sandra Cisneros wears Guadalupe earrings; they dangle from her tiny ears. A gardener I now and then hire has a belt buckle with the virgin’s face etched in silver. Everywhere one goes in Mexico, trinkets with the image of this holy icon are found: earrings, candle holders, head scarves, key chains. I wonder: Would Guadalupe have approved?

In the rear of the church, our pastor readies for the Mass, which he will say in the Spanish he has now perfected. Tired from the long wait, kids run in the aisles. To my right, a group of little girls, ribbons of red, white and green atop their heads, line up as a lady in traditional Mexican dress snaps their picture. Behind me an elderly man in a serape that dangles to his knees waves to a latecomer, a boy dressed like Juan Diego (white shirt and pants, leather sandals on his feet).

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The Mass has ended; the mariachis pack it up while the altar boys snuff out candles. Folks line up in front of a newly erected altar to pay personal homage to la virgen; some lay flowers at her feet.

At the back of the church, near the vestibule, I spot a former neighbor (Anglo). He looks dazed and confused. As he moves aside to let the feathered dancers go by, I hear him mutter, “Say, just what’s going on? Is this a party, or what?”