Our Lady of Guadelupe, a light in the darkness
She looks out my living room window, awake when others sleep. She vigils over the nomads of the street who wander, casing garbage cans and cars for anything left inside. A jacket, hand lotion, a flashlight, change. The paint on her cheek is chipped. Like the nomads of the street, she’s suffered many moves, stuffed into boxes, her aura wrapped in discarded news. She spent 20 years watching over my entryway, then a few more years atop a dresser next to a picture of my mother and a statue of the Sacred Heart carved by my brother. A relic of Pope Pius X sat at her feet.
Each Dec. 12, I put her in the window to look upon the intersection, decorating her mandorla with Christmas lights that blink (I copied Fr. Dave Matz). This year, she did not go back to her spot on the mother’s altar. She has been left to watch over the neighborhood. Jesse, a boy my son used to play with decades ago in the backyards of the neighborhood, walks by. Thin and bearded, red hair drapes down his back and sways as he lumbers up the block. He suffers from schizophrenia, as does his brother, who gestures in the air and yells obscenities at the trees. Jesse comes by to say hello and ask for a dollar when he’s taking his meds. Now Our Lady blesses him from the window even when I don’t have a bill to give him. She blesses the gardener who usually comes by to trim the neighbor’s hedge and sweep the walk. The gardener has not appeared in weeks. Maybe it’s the rain or ICE. She blesses them all.
Johanna, an elderly neighbor, drives by in her Honda Fit. Last year, I promised we would share scones and tea sometime. I haven’t done that yet. I took Johanna to Spanish Mass a while back because she is not religious and wanted to see what Mass was about. Johanna liked the mariachi music, but the rest was a bit of a mystery. Our Lady blesses her as she drives by.
Last weekend, Our Mother watched from the window as I circled my car back around the block on my way to the store. I saw a homeless man dressed in dirty sweats looking over our fence. She knew I was more worried about our bikes than his plight. There she was, looking on him as upon her Son.
The Ignatian Solidarity Network sent an email asking people to put the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe in the window to be a light in the darkness. Patron of the Americas, she welcomes all in her embrace. Our local refugee assistance organization, Welcome the Stranger, has a three-bedroom home that sits empty, awaiting a refugee family. Local organizations like Catholic Charities, the Jewish Community Organizations, or the International Rescue Committee have no families to refer. Families wait outside closed gates and bollard walls. May we look upon the pilgrims before us who walk a journey we do not know. May we put on their shoes, see them with Her eyes, and walk toward her Son.
Alameda Companion Gretchen Bailey