WHERE ARE YOU GOING, LADY?

The Mother of God emerges from heaven in all her majesty. A cherub carries her on his wings, wings of varied colors, like those of the birds of Mexico. Millions upon millions of angels precede her, formed in immense squadrons. Celestial music resounds throughout the universe, and the Angels of the Americas sing the march of redemption: that song of which David speaks in Psalm 110: Redemptionem missit populo suo (He sent redemption to his people).

As she passes, the stars that populate the immensity of the firmament bow before the firstborn of all creation.  The sun descends to bathe her in its rays, and the stars come to adorn her sea-green mantle... She is not preceded by lightning and thunder, as in times past when the God of Sinai appeared; but by the moon, a sign of peace and covenant, the covenant she comes to celebrate with a people who will be hers forever.

The angelic choirs ask in wonder: Quae est ista? 'Who is this most beautiful Virgin, whose complexion is dark and whose hair is as black as that of the daughters of Cuauhtémoc and Moctezuma? Whose waist is as slender as the palm trees of Anáhuac and whose eyes are as chaste as those of the doves of our lakes?'

They ask: 'Where are you going, Lady? Are you going to Rome, the Eternal City?' And Mary answers them: 'No'—'Are you going to Greece, the ancient homeland of science and the fine arts?'  "No." "Are you going to Spain, mistress of the seas, the richest in the world?" "No." "Are you going to Jerusalem, that beautiful captive, once sung of by David and Solomon, and now with its hair disheveled and its brow in the dust?"

"Are you going to Nazareth, to Mount Carmel, your former and beloved home?"

"No. I am going to an unknown corner of the world, which will be called Mexico. I am going to the simple nation of the Opatas, who live in Sonora under tents of chimborazoan hides, and to the nation of the Huastecas, who live in thatched huts under the palm trees of Potosí. I am going to the nation of the Otomites, who have no houses and sleep in hammocks, like the orioles that hang their net-like nests from the cypress trees of Querétaro."  I am going to the nation of the Tarascans, who practice their mechanical arts in Michoacán and the Sierra of Guanajuato. I am going to the nation of the Aztecs, who dwell in the lakes of Tenochtitlan, in Zacatecas, Jalisco, and Colima, and who, to the sound of their drum and their teponahuaxtli, and in the sweetest of languages, will sing me the praises of the New Testament.

I am going to the nation of the Totonacs, who are white, live on the slopes of Orizaba and Acultzingo, and practice circumcision, like those Israelites taken captive by Salmanazar, who were lost in the ice of Russia. I am going to the nation of the Mixtecs, who in Oaxaca build temples in the Etruscan style and cultivate cochineal, more precious than the murex of the Greeks.  I am going to the nation of the Chiapanecas, who live in Chiapas, who claim to be the inhabitants of the New World and descendants of a venerable old man who built a very large boat to save himself and his family from a global flood. I am going to the nation of the Chichimecas, who live in the miserable shacks of Jalostitlán, Teocaltiche, and Comanja.

From all these and many other nations with diverse languages, customs, beliefs, and governments, I am going to form a single family: one very great, very holy, very dear thing called the Fatherland; and I will be the Protector and the Mother of that new Fatherland. I carry the likeness of all Mexicans in the pupils of my eyes; I carry all their sorrows in my heart and their names written on my right hand. I am going to rescue their souls from sin and their bodies from brutality.

'I will not dwell in the marble palaces of Venice, nor in the gardens of the Alhambra in Granada, but on a barren mountain. I will live upon the rocks like a dove, to pray and move the Eternal One on behalf of my people, who until now have been wandering and unfortunate. I will not speak with Charles V nor with Francis I, but with an Indian, who has nothing more than a rough cloak, made from the fiber of his fields. On that cloak, which is the cradle of his children, I will imprint my likeness. And this likeness, which they will venerate in ecstasy, will be the token I leave to the Mexicans of my eternal love.'