La Sirena Mexican Folk Art: Nuestra Morenita

Next week is an important week in the Mexican community. On December 12^th thousands of people with gather in Mexico City and around the world to celebrate la Virgen de Guadalupe--a spiritual guide and spiritual mother to many.

The legend goes as follows:

MID-December in 1531 the Virgin appeared to Juan Diego, a native man, requesting a church to be built in her honor on top of the Hill of Tepeyac. Seeking to honor the the mother goddess, Juan Diego spoke to the Spanish Archbishop of Mexico City of his encounter. In response, the Archbishop instructed him to prove the identity of the Virgin. The Holy Mother appeared once again to her loyal follower instructing him to return to the top of Tepeyac Hill to collect flowers (an unexpected bloom in the middle of winter). He did as instructed and on the hill he found Castilian roses. Picking the roses and arranging them in his tilma (a native-peasant cloak), he returned to the Archbishop and on opening his cloak the roses fell and imprinted on his cloak was the image of the Virgen de Guadalupe.

That, however, is not the entire story. We cannot discuss the Virgen de Guadalupe without speaking of Tonantzin, a pre-Columbian earth goddess tenderly regarded as “Our Sacred Mother” in the Nahuatl language. Considered a reincarnate of Tonantzin, it is commonly said that the Virgin of Guadalupe and the pre-Columbian deity are one and the same. It is often forgotten that there was a shrine dedicated to Tonantzin on top of the Hill of Tepeyac. Both figures are mother deities that provide a source of comfort and love. Many look to her for moral support and encouragement and every year at midnight on December 12, they serenade her to reciprocate the spiritual fulfillment she provides to the community.