The Feast of Our lady of Guadalupe, Monday, December 12, 2022

Revelation 11, 19; 12, 1-6, 10

God’s temple in heaven was opened, and the Ark of his covenant could be seen in the temple. A great sign appeared in the sky, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. She was with child and wailed aloud in pain as she labored to give birth. Then another sign appeared in the sky; it was a huge red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and on its heads were seven diadems. Its tail swept away a third of the stars in the sky and hurled them down to the earth. Then the dragon stood before the woman about to give birth, to devour her child when she gave birth. She gave birth to a son, a male child, destined to rule all the nations with an iron rod. Her child was caught up to God and his throne. The woman herself fled into the desert where she had a place prepared by God. Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say: “Now have salvation and power come, and the Kingdom of our God and the authority of his Anointed.”

This feast commemorates the appearance of the Blessed Virgin Mary, in the garb of an Aztec woman, to an Aztec man named Juan Diego, a convert to the Faith who was helping to teach the faith as a catechism.  The two options for the First Reading (the other being Zechariah 2, 14-27, according to the New American Bible, but 2, 10-13, in the Douay Rheims and RSV) emphasize the coming of the Church to the Gentiles of the newly discovered lands of the Western Hemisphere, for which the Virgin’s appearance paved the way.

Revelation 12 is used, since the advent of the new lectionary in 1970, for feasts of the Blessed Virgin Mary, but the Fathers did not associate this text with her.  The first reference I have found in my work on medieval commentaries on the book we now call that of Revelation comes in the  commentary by Alcuin of York (d. 804).  St. Albert the Great, in his massive commentary, does not mention her at all.  Not that it cannot be seen as giving insights into her holiness or her role as the Mother of the Church, but only within narrow constraints.  Thus, the use of this text for this feast, especially when compared with the option from Zechariah, which speaks of the coming of the Lord from heaven, speaks to the victory of the Church in the New World.

“God’s Temple in heaven was opened, and the ark of his covenant could be seen in the temple.”  Even in the Book of Revelation, filled with wondrous and even shocking signs, the idea of the heavenly Temple, which served as the model for the Temple in Jerusalem, opened in such a way as to reveal the Ark of the covenant would have given pause to the reader.  First of all, the Ark had been kept in the Holy of Holies, a room within a room, surrounded by a curtain.  That is, when it still had its place within the first Temple before that Temple was destroyed by the Babylonians.  Second, the Ark disappeared at this time and was not found again afterwards.  Therefore, the reader, composing himself, would recall that this is a sign.  The sign tells us of the revelation to the world of the Incarnation of the Son of God.  

“A great sign appeared in the sky, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.”  The woman is the Holy Church, or, to be more specific, the Church Victorious in heaven.  We should know that at present the Church exists in three ways: the Church Militant, on earth, contending against evil and struggling to spread the Faith; the Church suffering, that is, the souls in purgatory who have emerged from the Church on earth and are now being fitted for their white robes, as it were; and the Church Victorious, the saints in heaven, including the holy men and women of the Old Testament.  The Woman “in the sky” signifies the Church in heaven.  She is “clothed with the sun”, signifying her glory and approval by Almighty God; the moon, which is changeable as viewed from earth, signifies the world in which we live and of her rule over it; and the “crown of twelve stars” signifies her place in heaven.  “She was with child and wailed aloud in pain as she labored to give birth.”  The Church in heaven gives birth to the Church on earth.  This is a sign of the heavenly destiny of her children.  She is said to “wail aloud in pain” not to indicate that one can suffer in heaven, which is not possible, but to show that this is a true birth.  It is the sign of this.  This birth comes about through the reception of the Faith by the individual human as a result of instruction in it, on the one hand, and the consideration of it, often accompanied by initial doubts, confusion, and fear, on the other.  A person’s conversion is seldom an easy, straight-forward event.

“Then another sign appeared in the sky; it was a huge red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and on its heads were seven diadems.”  The dragon in this sign is a travesty of the sign of the Lamb as found in Revelation 5, 6.  The purpose of the travesty is to show how the devil attempts to appear as a savior, but cannot do this convincingly because his works are evil and ever lead to death and destruction.  He is said to appear in the sky as though alongside the Church, but his place is not there.  This signifies the devil’s boldness.  

“Its tail swept away a third of the stars in the sky and hurled them down to the earth.”  Some Fathers conclude from this that the devil, in his rebellion before the world began, led a third of the angels whom God had created, against God.  We can also understand this through the interpretation of the Fathers of Revelation 6, 13, in which stars are described as falling from heaven: this is the apostasy of many Church leaders — especially the higher clergy — accomplished by the devil in his continual fight against the Church.  Their being “hurled” to the earth shows the devil’s contempt even of his followers.  Another sign of this is that it uses its “tail” to do this.  “Then the dragon stood before the woman about to give birth, to devour her child when she gave birth.”  The devil cannot directly attack the Church Victorious.  Instead, he tried to destroy her children on earth, especially at the time of their baptism.  It is much harder for him to destroy a baptized person than an in baptized one.  “She gave birth to a son, a male child, destined to rule all the nations with an iron rod.”  This is the Church Militant, who will spread throughout the world and “rule” the nations through his teaching of the commandments of God.  “Her child was caught up to God and his throne.”  That is, the Church on earth, even when persecuted, is protected by God.  “The woman herself fled into the desert where she had a place prepared by God.”  A gap of several verses occurs in the lectionary reading exists between the previous verse and this one.  The verses in the gap describe the Archangel Michael’s defeat of the devil, which signifies the protection of the Church on earth by God, and also looks forward to the devil’s definitive defeat at the end of the world.  The woman, the Church Victorious, “flees” (or, “escapes” or “shuns”) into a “deserted place” ( not a “desert”) for “one thousand two hundred and sixty days”, a detail left out of the lectionary, amounting to three and a half years, which is the duration of the Lord’s public ministry, according to St. John.  This signifies that the Church Victorious is not yet filled up, but awaits the arrival of all her saints in the days to come.  The “three and a half years”, the time of the Lord’s work on earth becomes the sign of the Church’s work on earth, and this number is used accordingly throughout Revelation. 

“Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say: “Now have salvation and power come, and the Kingdom of our God and the authority of his Anointed.”  The heavens themselves cry out that the Kingdom of God and the authority of his Anointed, Jesus Christ, have come on the earth.  This cry is continuous from the moment of the Incarnation of our Lord until the Last Judgment begins.

The grand drama of this vision presents to us the meaning of human history and its underpinnings, of which the conversion of the New World, which began in great earnest through the visitation of the Blessed Virgin to Juan Diego, is a part.