Cardinal Marc Ouellet, president of the Pontifical Commission for
Latin America, presented a golden rose from Pope Francis to Our Lady of
Guadalupe, calling the rose a sign of love, gratitude and enthusiasm.
“Our hearts more than our heads know the debt of love we owe you,” the
cardinal said to the Blessed Mother. “This is why we beg you to receive
from us a special gesture of grateful love.”
He prayed that the rose remind the Virgin Mary of “the gold,
frankincense, and myrrh offered by the magi who once hastened to the
manger to adore the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.”
Cardinal Ouellet presented the golden rose Nov. 18 at Our Lady of
Guadalupe Basilica in Mexico City as part of the “Our Lady of Guadalupe,
Star of the New Evangelization” conference, led by the Pontifical
Commission for Latin America and co-sponsored by the Knights of
Columbus, the Guadalupe basilica and the Institute of Higher Guadalupan
Studies.
The cardinal led the congregation in a reflection and heartfelt prayer
to Our Lady of Guadalupe before the presentation of the golden rose to
the Virgin Mary, whose 500-year-old image is imprinted on the tilma of
St. Juan Diego.
“May our unity and ardor in evangelization be eloquent signs of our
living faith, in this Year of Faith when the whole Church rejoices to
celebrate Jesus’ victory over sin and death, the victory of love over
hatred and ingratitude,” he said.
“May our faith be creative and conquering!” the cardinal exhorted, stressing the need for a renewal in faith.
“Let us ask God together, you our Mother and we with you as a single
family, to increase, purify and strengthen our faith, to make it more
courageous and radiant, so that the world may believe in the name of
Jesus, the Son of the living God, our sole and unique Savior,” he said.
He praised Mary’s famous response to the greeting of her cousin
Elizabeth, the Magnificat, saying her prayer “does not cease to glorify
God from age to age for his goodness and his mercy.”
“Compassionate and fruitful Mother, we owe to your loving presence in
each community the fidelity of this continent to its Christian vocation.
Your maternal love knows no boundaries, but you have watched over the
Americas in a particular way.”
Cardinal Ouellet asked the Virgin Mary to help Catholics convert their hearts and spread the Gospel.
“We beg you to visit us again to illumine the path of evangelization in
our age, which is so forgetful of God, for you are the living memory of
his graces, the pole-star in the heaven of his wonders,” he said.
“Every one of your visits to our heart is an invitation to conversion,
an incitement to live a more ardent charity toward all, but especially
toward those who are suffering the most, those whom your son has
privileged and whom he asks us to love without calculation or
conditions.”
Cardinal Ouellet also voiced thanks that Pope Francis, the first Pope
from the Americas, is “so zealously reviving evangelization among the
poor.”
“Let us pray that he be loved and heard!” he said, asking that those who
listened to the Pope’s July message at World Youth Day in Brazil
remember the pontiff’s words and “commit themselves resolutely with
Francis in the revolution of love.”
He further prayed that Our Lady of Guadalupe help the bishops of the
Americas to listen to her message “with the same emotion” as “all the
evangelizing saints who walked the same paths before us.”
“Blessed be God for your presence among us in this great holy house
built by your care, Mother of the Church in the Americas,” the
cardinal’s prayer concluded. “My soul magnifies the Lord!”