Guadalupe: from Tepeyac to Rome and Cádiz, a bridge of faith
Part II
Index
Via Sistina 11: The Virgin of Guadalupe in a Roman corner?
In the church of San Ildefonso and Santo Tomás de Villanueva, located in Via Sistina 11, in the heart of Rome, a jewel of art and Marian devotion is kept: one of the first images of the Virgin of Guadalupe to arrive in the Eternal City. Numerous historians and scholars agree that this work occupies a privileged place among the oldest European testimonies of the Guadalupan event.
This space has been home to the Augustinian Recollect community since 1619. There, in the San Ildefonso and Santo Tomás de Villanueva International College, the friars delve into theological disciplines in the Roman universities. At the same time, this community guards one of the most significant treasures that the Augustinian Recollects can preserve: a canvas that explicitly narrates the miracle of Tepeyac, and that arrived in Rome just a century after the apparitions.
Via Sistina 11 is today a meeting point, prayer and consolation for Latin American, European and pilgrims from all over the world. It is a visible bridge between cultures, as if the Mother of God had wanted to establish in this Roman corner a home from which to continue accompanying the history of her children.
Origin, arrival and historical context of the painting
The work dates from 1667 and was painted in Mexico, according to the documentation preserved. It arrived in Rome in 1672, brought by an Augustinian Recollect religious, who acted as a spiritual and cultural bridge between the American Church and the universal Church. Whoever contemplates it today is not faced with a simple devotional reproduction, but with a complete pictorial account of the Guadalupan event.
The canvas, attributed to the New Spanish painter Juan Correa, shows the Virgin of Guadalupe at the culminating moment of the apparition, and Juan Diego holding his tilma while the roses fall to the ground, an unmistakable sign of the miracle before the bishop and those present. This detail—unusual for European representations of the time—makes the work a testimony of extraordinary historical and artistic value.
The chapel where the painting is exhibited also preserves four other works by the same author, which represent the previous apparitions of the Virgin to Juan Diego. The ensemble constitutes a complete narrative cycle, probably the first of its kind to arrive in Rome.
The prior of the convent, Friar Javier Monroy, expresses it in these words:
“This painting is very important for Rome, for the Augustinian Recollects and for the history of art in general, because it is one of the first paintings of the Guadalupan event to arrive in Rome. It was brought by an Augustinian Recollect in 1672. Its particularity is that it does not only reproduce the image, but narrates the miracle.”
Its arrival took only a few decades from the apparitions. This reveals not only the speed with which the devotion spread throughout the world, but also the sensitivity of the Order to guard and disseminate this Marian invocation born in the heart of America.
The artistic, devotional and identity value of the image
The chapel that houses the work is carefully decorated: a marble altar with inlays where an eagle stands out on a nopal—a Mexican national symbol that connects with the indigenous tradition of Tepeyac—, stuccos with cherubs, golden cornices, a crown on the main painting and a relief of the Holy Spirit that presides over the ensemble. Nothing is accessory: the composition creates a symbolic environment that welcomes the faith of a people and introduces it into the spiritual memory of the universal Church.
The four smaller paintings that accompany the main painting make up a catechetical account: each one represents an episode of the apparitions narrated in the Nican Mopohua. As a whole, the five works form a visual catechesis that translates the Guadalupan history into the European artistic language of the 17th century without losing the indigenous symbolic richness.
It is not an isolated painting: it is a testimony that wants to preserve history, prevent it from being lost and permanently remember the action of God in the New World.
The Virgin of Guadalupe in the life of the Augustinian Recollect community in Rome
For the Augustinian Recollect community of Via Sistina 11, this image is more than a work of art. It is a living memory of the American evangelization and, at the same time, a deep link with the universal Church. From 1672 to today, generations of religious, students, pilgrims and faithful have prayed before this image, finding in it consolation, identity and company.
Many Latin Americans residing in Rome find here a spiritual refuge: before this Virgin they feel that their land, their culture and their history are still alive, sustained by the tenderness of Mary. The presence of the painting in this centuries-old community reminds us that the Guadalupan devotion has been part of the spiritual life of the Order since very early times.
Rome and Guadalupe: the universalization of an American devotion
The presence of one of the first Guadalupan images in Rome confirms that the devotion to the Virgin of Guadalupe did not remain confined to the limits of America. Already in the 17th century it had been inserted into the heart of the universal Church, as a sign of unity, motherhood and mission. Its irradiation reached Europe and the Philippines, and centuries later, Pope Francis continues to show a deep devotion towards her, celebrating every December 12 a solemn mass in her honor.
Thanks to the faithful custody of the Augustinian Recollect community, this image has not only survived the passage of time, but has kept the devotion alive, adapting to new cultural and spiritual contexts. Via Sistina 11 has become, thus, an authentic house of Guadalupe, where history, faith, art and memory converge.
It is a gift to think that in one of the oldest communities of our Order—if not the oldest—, the Virgin of Guadalupe is present. As if she had wanted to enter the history of this religious family to be a bridge between the religious, the culture and the people of God.
