The Pro-Life Message and Our Lady of Guadalupe

On December 12^th the Catholic Church celebrated the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Patroness of the Americas and the Preborn. How desperately does modern society need the profound truths contained in this apparition of Our Lady—a message of prayer, love and compassion. In Mary’s motherly love we find the courage to emulate her faith and the strength to proceed with confidence, knowing that God will overcome the seemingly insurmountable barriers we face in life and the world today.

Her message remains relevant still, especially in Western society and culture that are “wounded by the active preaching of a practical and pragmatic atheism,” says Pope Francis. In the midst of this modern-day turmoil and cultural battleground, “[Mary] wants to stay with us. She begs us to allow her to be our mother, to open our lives to her Son Jesus and to welcome His message so as to learn to love like Him.”

Apparitions Spark Conversion

In the year 1531, the Blessed Mother appeared to a lowly Nahua peasant of Aztec descent by the name of Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin. At the time, the Aztec religion was thriving in Mexico. In this apparition Mary appears in the manner of a pregnant mother, the only apparition where this occurs. In her womb is the preborn Christ, the Savior of the world. Her presence in this manner proclaims the sanctity and blessedness of life within the womb and communicates the joy and wonder with which we must approach the gift of life.

In contradiction to the Aztec civilization that had a long history of practicing human sacrifice, which included children, Mary’s presence offered a new vision and hope for a culture that had long devalued human life and lived in fear. In contrast, to the blood-thirsty gods of the Aztecs, we find the image of a woman, pregnant with new life, pointing to the sacrifice of her Son who gave His blood for the salvation of all—offered as a free gift, accessible through repentance, faith, and baptism. 

In the wake of the appearance of Our Lady of Guadalupe to Juan Diego, the Christian religion spread like wildfire with millions of indigenous peoples converting to the Christian faith in the ensuing decades, marking a turning point in the history of Mexico. Juan Diego and his wife were among some of the first Aztecs to be baptized, embracing a religion that differed radically from that followed by their own people.

Made by God’s Love

Unsurprisingly, human sacrifice quickly died out, in part because the Spanish conquistadors outlawed it, but eventually because such barbarity was completely incompatible with the widespread acceptance of a faith that preached radical love of God for human beings, who were made in His image and likeness (Gen 1:27).

The result is that since the 16^th century, Latin America, under the patronage of Our Lady of Guadalupe, has been a powerful example of a dynamic Catholic culture. Even as most of the developed West has fallen to atheism and post-modern barbarity, including the widespread killing of preborn human beings in abortion, Latin America has held fast, valiantly fighting to protect a Culture of Life.

But that has changed.

Tragically today, out of 33 countries that make up the Latin American community, only a handful do not permit abortion.

Fruits of the Same Tree

In 1965, Cuba became the first country in the Americas to decriminalize aspects of its abortion laws, Canada following suit in 1968, and the states of Hawaii, Washington, Alaska, and New York in the United States by 1970. Today, most Latin American countries permit abortion in varying degrees, leading to millions of innocent preborn children being killed by abortion.

As abortion has become normalized across these once life-and family-loving cultures, we cannot ignore its connection to contraception, as “fruits of the same tree” (Evangelium vitae, no. 13). The close connection exists mentally between the practices of contraception and abortion. After all, those who desire to prevent pregnancy through contraception will seek an abortion when contraception fails. Moreover, once this mentality is embraced, even celebrated, it creates a radical change in social and cultural perceptions about marriage and the marital act, human life, the human person, and morality itself. In other words, it changes the consciousness and behavior of whole cultures, undermining marriage and family as the bedrock of society, trivializing sex, and leading to a growth in unwanted pregnancies, which inexorably leads to abortion.

As reported by the World Bank Group, 30% of married women in Mexico in 1980 reported using some form of contraception, whereas latest data shows it at over 73%. And as compared to 1960 in which the average woman in Mexico welcomed 7 children, today the total fertility rate (TFR) in Mexico and for Latin American (33 countries) is just over 1.8 babies born per woman. This is well below the replacement rate needed to sustain a population, which is about 2.1 births per woman over her life.

Contraception helps to ingrain abortion and other anti-life practices into the culture. And because of their acceptance and normalization, the Latin American community is now experiencing an overall fertility decline with similar societal and cultural impacts seen across Europe and other Western countries.

The Return to Child Sacrifice

While in the United States abortion is receding in some states, as a recent article reports, many countries in Latin America are going in the opposite direction. The United Nations’ Department of Economic and Social Affairs Population Division projects that by 2030 all countries in Latin America and the Caribbean will be below replacement.

For example, since the decriminalization of abortion in Mexico in 2007, the violence against nascent human life has steadily increased. Mexico City—previously called the Federal District—was the first of the 32 states of the Republic to decriminalize abortion, allowing it up to 12 weeks.Twelve years later, abortion was decriminalized in Oaxaca, and in 2021, Hidalgo and Veracruz followed.

Then, in 2021, the Supreme Court of Justice (i.e., Mexican Supreme Court) ruled against the pro-life laws of the State of Coahuila, decriminalizing abortion. This egregious act by the High Court was the first time that a state in Mexico was forced to eliminate its pro-life laws. This created a precedent that pro-life activists worried would be further used to attack the pro-life laws in the country’s other states, imposing anti-life ideologies that harm individuals, families, and society. This concern is not without merit since judicial activism is something we have seen far too many times in countries where long-held pro-life articles exist in their constitutions and legislative attempts to decriminalize abortion have failed.

Tragically, the push to further decriminalize abortion in Mexico (and across Latin America) continues to gain momentum, fostering a frightening trend. As reported in a recent Catholic News Agency article, “Over the past six years [2018-24], the legalization of abortion has accelerated rapidly in Mexico, with 19 of the country’s 32 states taking steps to decriminalize the deadly procedure.” The author outlines how powerful individuals and political movements have successfully altered the cultural landscape in favor of abortion, normalizing a mindset and deadly practice that is ending the lives of Mexico’s youngest and weakest of citizens, the preborn. And since the inauguration of President Claudia Sheinbaum in October, an additional six states have decriminalized abortion up to 12 weeks.

A Spiritual Battle

As the moral decline of the Americas (and the world) intensifies and spreads across the globe and we experience growing injustice towards human dignity, we are in desperate need of renewal, conversion, and amendment of life. We know that once our morality begins moving in a particular direction it accumulates an extraordinary momentum (the tendency to keep moving), which is very difficult to change. And right now, the momentum in the Americas seems to all be going in the wrong direction. This reality can be disconcerting, leading to discouragement and even despair.

We need heavenly guidance and intervention. We need the message of Our Lady of Guadalupe.

This message assures us of God’s close attention. Through the Virgin Mother, God continues to give us His Son. Mary is an icon of tender maternity and maternal strength, and of the utmost value and dignity of human life from its earliest stages.

Nearly five centuries ago the Lord sent Mary to help Juan Diego and the people of Mexico discover the Gospel of Life. Presenting herself as the “Mother of the true God for whom we live” (cf. Nican Mopohua), Mary promises to attend to the needs of her children, excluding no one from her motherly embrace and consolation.

Mary, carrying Jesus, the source of life, becomes an occasion of joy, blessing, and the affirmation of the dignity of life. She tells Juan Diego,

I am honored to be your compassionate mother, yours and that of all the people that live together in this land, and also of all the other various lineages of men; those who love me, those who cry to me, those who seek me, those who trust in me. Because there truly will I hear their cry, their sadness, to remedy, to cure all their various troubles, their miseries, their pains.

Our Lady Will Triumph

Though all seems dark, similar to the era in which Our Lady of Guadalupe entered, the message remains the same. We are not abandoned or alone, left to the whims of this world and its destructive ideologies. The Lord continues to send us His Mother, who invites us to trust in the “true God for whom we live,” confidently directing us to reaffirm our belonging to God.

This story could not be more evocative and more affirming of our great mission to defend the most defenseless. Let us remember that within eight years after Mary’s first appearance to Juan Diego, over eight million Mexicans converted and received baptism, which defied all human expectations. And just as human sacrifice ended in Mexico after Our Lady’s appearance, we hope that by her intercession and our trust in God’s will, the sacrifice of preborn children by abortion (and other atrocities that assault human dignity) will also end throughout the Americas and across the world.

Many of our political, social, and cultural issues are really spiritual issues and require a spiritual solution. In contemplating Mary’s simplicity, we find the strength to emulate her faith and proceed with confidence. As Mary’s “yes” to God changed the course of human history, by saying “yes” to God, and through our daily work and sacrifices, we too can bring about genuine renewal in our world, where every life is welcomed, respected, and served.

We need recourse to Mary, our heavenly mother and intercessor, to win the battle. And by meditating on the life, death and resurrection of Jesus we obtain the graces to live for Christ alone. To this end, let us participate in daily Mass, when possible, go to Adoration, pray the daily Rosary, consecrate ourselves to Mary’s Immaculate Heart, pray novenas to Our Lady of Guadalupe, and beg for the conversion of our culture.