EcuBlog from Fr. John Ford

“Why Would Lutherans Celebrate the Virgin Mary of Guadalupe?”—this is the question raised by Professor Maxwell E. Johnson, a Lutheran professor of liturgical studies at the University of Notre Dame. Johnson’s “theological meditation” on the well known apparitions in Mexico in 1531, emphasizes three reasons for celebrating “Mary of Guadalupe”: first, she proclaims the Gospel to us; second, she embodies God’s unmerited grace for us; third, “she is a type and model of what the Church is to be in the world.”

This short essay, which could well serve as a launching pad for ecumenical discussion between Protestants and Catholics, appeared in The Treasure of Guadalupe, edited by Virgilio Elizondo, Allan Figueroa Deck, and Timothy Matovina (Lanham-Boulder-New York-Toronto-Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2006), 87-94. An appendix in this small book provides an English translation of the Náhautl account of the apparition (109-120).