Guadalupe image available

More than 100 copies of the image are currently being circulated throughout the Diocese. "Coordinators" take a Pilgrim Image and arrange for people in their area to each take it into their homes for a week. When a year has passed, the image is returned to the coordinator, who may keep it.

"This is not a fad or a trinket we're passing around," stated diocesan coordinator Janice Flynn. She hopes Catholics who accept the image into their homes pray with Mary and guarantees "something will happen" for those who do.

The story of Our Lady of Guadalupe began in Mexico in 1531. Aztec Indian Juan Diego was walking to Mass when he had a vision of the Blessed Mother. He told his bishop, who asked for proof. The Blessed Mother appeared to Juan Diego again and told him to fill his tilma (cape) with roses that were growing on a rocky hilltop where flowers had never grown before.

When Juan Diego brought the roses to the bishop, he opened his tilma to reveal not only the flowers, but an image that had appeared on the cape of the Blessed Mother -- Our Lady of Guadalupe.

The original image of Our Lady of Guadalupe has lasted since that time. The Pilgrim Image, or photograph of Mary's face from the tilma, began to be circulated in 1981. Today, the Pilgrim Image Apostolate is dedicated to sending the image around the world. Pope John Paul II has been quoted as saying that the U.S. must get to know Our Lady of Guadalupe better. During his visit to Mexico in January, he entrusted the entire American continent to her protection.

"At the approach of the great jubilee," he said later, "the Church invites us all to meet the living Jesus Christ, the way to conversion, communion and solidarity. Through the intercession of Our Lady of Guadalupe, may Christ be ever more fully the light of the peoples of the new world."

Local organizers of the Pilgrim Image's travels hope a shrine is created for Our Lady of Guadalupe in the Albany Diocese, and boast of conversions, vocations and faith sparked by Our Lady's intercession.

"She's out there blessing us," Ms. Flynn said.

(To arrange for the Pilgrim Image to visit your home, call Janice Flynn at 393-6499.)

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