On the 9th of December 1531, Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared at Tepeyac hill, in Mexico City. She came to give, show and exalt “the Only One True God through whom we live” and to crush the head of the serpent of “Child Sacrifice”. The Mexican natives, or Aztecs, lived in a very structured and organised manner, and their religious practices were very disturbing and depraved. Prisoners of war would be offered in sacrifice to pagan idols, their chests cut open and their hearts ripped out, in order to ‘feed’ and ‘appease’ the anger of their false gods, else their life cycle was in danger. For the Aztecs truly believed that the sun might not rise the following day if they did not offer it human blood. The Aztec Empire was incredibly advanced, complex and well organized. So, how did such a sophisticated society become so evil? Sin obscures the consciousness of the human person, leading to moral blindness and multiple errors.
The Aztecs, in their blindness, were convinced to be doing the right thing. They genuinely wanted to please their ’gods’ in order to praise them for the gift of life, sustenance, and success in war against their enemies. The same is true of our present age, for, although we may argue that we live in highly developed societies, we cannot ignore the innumerable lives that have been lost through abortion, euthanasia and war crimes.
It was the Lady who ended the Aztec Child Sacrifice. By 1541, just 10 years after her appearance to Juan Diego, a historian of the time wrote that 9 million people in Mexico had converted to Catholicism! In a non-bloody way, the people of an entire country were converted. They left behind their old, cruel gods and discovered the truth of the Incarnation.