The Tepeyac Family Center is named for a hill outside of Mexico City where over 460 years ago a 57 year old Aztec Indian, named Juan Diego, was on his way to Mass and heard the voice of a woman calling him by name in his native language. She identified herself as the ever virgin Mary, mother of the true God who gives life and maintains it. She asked Juan to go to the local Bishop and relay the message that she wanted a church built on Tepeyac Hill where previously there had been a temple to an Aztec mother goddess, and where thousands of humans were sacrificed to placate this and other deities.
On his third trip to the Bishop on the 12th of December 1531, Juan brought the sign the Bishop had asked for, Spanish, Castillian roses, that he found at the direction of the Virgin on top of the frozen ground of Tepeyac Hill. She arranged the roses in Juan's tilma, or cloak, prior to the visit, and when they fell to the ground in the presence of the Bishop, all knelt in awestruck wonder at the image left on Juan's tilma. It is the heavenly protrait of the Mother of God with beautiful and delicate indian features.
Two supernatural aspects of the image on Juan's tilma confront us today. First, the tilma is actually three pieces of cactus cloth sewn together. These fibers normally decay within 25 years, yet this image has remained intact despite the exposure to candle smoke and the elements over the four centuries. Second, art authorities are stumped by the composition of the hues, part oil, part water color. These colors are as brilliant today as they were over 400 years ago wheather seen up close or at a distance. These same authorities are stumped by the lack of evidence of brush strokes on the tilma.
Another incredible aspect of the tilma is that opticle studies done in the last 40 years using infrared and computers enhanced imagery of the Virgin's eyes, reveal human figures within the pupils as if she captured in a picture those people below her when the tilma was opened and the roses fell the first time!
Historically, the Aztecs used a language of pictures, and they understood the image to be a message. This image then becomes a visual letter from heaven:
- standing in front of the sun and on the moon - she is greater than their gods
- head bent and eyes down - not a goddess herself, but humble and interceding
- hands folded - means "I have something to offer, as in bearing a gift"
- waist with black sash - an Aztec maternity band, "I carry new life for the nation"
- cross on the broach - she follows the Christianity of the Spanish missionaries
- rabbit fur cuffs and blue mantle - means nobility
The title of the image "Holy Mary of Guadalupe" was given by Juan's uncle who was cured of typhus that same 12th of December. Guadalupe is an Aztec phrase that translates, "She who crushes the stone serpent". The reign of the serpent idol, Quetzlcoatl, who received so many child sacrifiecs was now over, and the reign of Christ, whose mother is pictured in books of Genesis and Revelation has begun (Gen 3:15, and Rev 12:1-18). Because of the Aztec response to the message seen on the tilma, nine million converted to Christianity occurring from 1531 to 1538, with the child sacrifices stopping almost immediatly!
 The Church on Tepeyac Hill in Mexico City where this image is displayed is the place where I [Dr. John Bruchalski] began a conversion process in the summer of 1987. Working as an obstetrician and gynecologist in the United State, and dealing with the issues of conception, contraception, fertility and sexuality on a daily basis, I found myself amidst a profession and a nation that had a burgeoning sexually transmitted disease rate, including the deadly HIV virus; an increasing out-of-wedlock birth rate; an increasing divorce rate, and an under reported spouse and child abuse rate. Also evident is a contraceptive mentality that demands a liberal abortion policy where one in three children is aborted, partial birth abortion is tolerated and wantedness dictates wheather the child lives or dies.
This conversion of mine was translated into the founding of the Tepeyac Family Center in 1994. We who work at the Center are called to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ in the setting of a medical practice that deals with women's healthcare, the gift of life called children, and the environment that nourishes them, which is the family. Fertility is viewed as healthy and natural, something to be cooperated with and not suppressed or frustrated. Natural Family Planning then becomes the vital tool that communicates the language of the body into the language of medical science, so we can understand the normal and treat the disease. Children in this paradigm are viewed as gifts from God and not contraceptive failures, nor unwanted pregnancies. The family is then supported as the relationship which most closely resembles the unconditional love of God for His children.
Tepeyac was placed in the name of this medical practice to remind us continually that Jesus Christ wants to give us abundant life in body, soul and spirit. This abundant life comes from Jesus showing us the way to the Father's love, and Mary, as mother of Jesus, wants to tell us how thoroughly and totally her Son's love heals. As the Virgin said to Juan Diego over 400 years ago:
"Hear and let it penetrate your heart my dear little one: let nothing discourage you, let nothing alter your heart or countenance. Also do not fear any illness or trouble, anxiety or pain. Am I not here who am your mother? Are you not under my shadow and protection? Am I not your fountain of life? Are you not in the folds of my mantle? In the crossing of my arms? Is there anything else you need?"
This picture, which hangs in our waiting room, is placed there to remind us that Mary's honor comes from her initial yes that brought Jesus into this world (Lk 1:38), and her unique ability to lead us to her Son. There, Jesus listens to her as He did at Cana (Jn 2:1-12), performing His first public miracle. Because we are adopted children of God with Christ as our brother (Gal 4:3-6), she becomes our spiritual mother, being given to us by Jesus at the foot of the cross on Golgotha (Jn 19:25-27). If the Christian life is the reproduction of Jesus in our souls, then perfection, the perfect reproduction, is the transformation of the soul in Jesus (Gal 2:20). Jesus is reproduced in us just as He was produced the first time in Nazareth: conceived by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary when she spoke her initail yes.
Our prayer is that the Tepeyac Family Center will serve you as a means to touch the healing power of God's mercy and love; that it may nurture a deeper respect for all stages of human life; a greater appreciation of the dignity of the person as a temple of the Holy Spirit, and a practical knowledge of the medical signs and symptoms that are the language of the body. Mary of Guadalupe leads us to Jesus and calls to us as she did at Cana, "Do whatever He tells you." (Jn 2:5).
John T. Bruchalski, MD, FACOG
12th of December 1997 AD
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