Dear Friend, 

Reflection by Rev. Doug Milewki, S.T.D.

The Empress

In 1945, Pope Pius XII bestowed on Our Lady of Guadalupe the title “Empress of the Americas.”  In 1999, Pope St. John Paul II fine-tuned that designation by calling Our Lady “Patroness of America.”  A single territory.  A single Church.  A single Patroness and Empress.  A single mission.

Imperial titles might ring odd in ears on this side of the globe.  Monarchs – Canada excepted – have not lasted long here.  Yet, the season of Advent does, after all, come from imperial protocol, the obligation to duly greet the sovereign while still at a distance and accord him all honor.  Now, halfway to the arrival of her Son the King of kings, the Empress arrives and calls for our attendance and attention.

But she comes in haste and on her way – to hill country and lowlands, to coasts and interior regions, to cities and farms.  Not to be feted and made at leisure, but to be accompanied and imitated.  She served in the Old World as the first carrier of the Word.  She comes to the New World as the premier Evangelist.  Will she go on her mission unassisted or with as many disciples as she found in the first baptized lands?

The last time Christians lived under an emperor it was as a single Church, characterized by East-West parts and the Greek and Latin languages plus a range of more local varieties, but still a Church that understood itself as one.  Today we are a Church commonly understood in North-South regions speaking mostly Spanish, English, Portuguese, Creole, and French as its dominant tongues.  Yet still one Church in this hemisphere.    

The Patroness and Empress of America comes in haste and on her way seeking the same zeal here for her task that she found elsewhere.

Our Lady of Guadalupe, pray for us, for our share in your mission, and for your land.

Know someone who may be interested in receiving our daily reflection emails? Invite them to sign up by visiting our subscription page.

Rev. Douglas Milewski, S.T.D., Associate Professor of Undergraduate Theology, earned an S.T.B. in Theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome, and an S.T.L. and an S.T.D. in Patristic Sciences and Theology from the Institutum Patristicum Augustinianum of the Pontifical Lateran University, Rome. His doctoral dissertation is titled “‘Nos Locus Dei Sumus.’ Augustine’s Exegesis and Theology of John 17 in the Light of In Evangelium Ioannis Tractatus CIV-CXI.” Father Milewski’s specializations include the theology, literature and history of early Christianity and the Fathers of the Church, in particular, Saint Augustine.