ABSTRACT
Stage 1 (Basilica de Guadalupe, Mexico City, July 31, 2002): On his fifth and final visit to Mexico, Pope John Paul II canonizes Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin (the Náhuatl name appearing on all Vatican publicity)—the Indian man to whom the Virgin of Guadalupe, Mexico’s patron saint, is said to have appeared in 1531. 1 The canonization, taking place at the Basilica of the Virgin of Guadalupe on the famous hill of Tepeyac, makes Juan Diego the first indigenous saint in the Americas. The following day, on August 1, the Pope beatifies two Indian (Zapotec) peasant men, Juan Bautista and Jacinto de los Angeles, from the Zapotec town of San Francisco Cajonos located in Oaxaca, one of the most indigenous and socially and politically marginal states in the country. 2 Both Juan Diego’s canonization ceremony and that of the two Mártires de Cajonos (as the Church called them) include the active participation of indigenous persons and elements—music, dress, dance, healing rites, even incense—of apparently indigenous origin. They are broadcast live to millions via the national television channels, and in Mexico City to the thousands filling the central city plaza or zócalo where masses of people watch the event on a giant screen (see Villamil). The ceremonies provoke much media coverage and commentary, both celebratory (the canonization makes Mexico home of the first indigenous saint in Latin America) and critical (left-leaning intellectuals in officially secular Mexico still love to hate the Church). The Church also promotes the rites widely on its website, including the homilies of John Paul II.
