The image of La Guadalupana
I live in a Mexican Catholic household. Growing up I went to church a lot and there I got to know about La Guadalupana. She is a very important figure in the Hispanic Catholic church. The most common way we see her is as a statue or an image. We celebrate her in December. A memorable memory was in December, we do this every year. Near or at the end of mass there is a car that holds her image . We have the chinelos, which are people who wear masks and at least one or two have an animal mask on. Then we have the musicians, which would either be the church choir or the mariachi. Then at the back we have her image . We walk around the neighborhood, and this is usually at night. We walk until we are back in front of the church.
It doesn't matter where you are from or what religion you are. We are able to celebrate your culture out in the open and express it how you want it because of the First Amendment of having a diversity of religion. We are able to do so without the fear of execution because we believe in the “wrong religion”. The first Roman Catholic Spanish church opened on February 23, 1902, The church of our Lady Guadalupe. Many Hispanics weren't able to go to church, confess or even get married because the majority of the churches didn't give mass in Spanish. It was all in English and this created a huge barrier. Any people are able to open up or have mosques, churches, temples, and a synagogue to be able to pray and be proud of it. We can celebrate it in the open and show how we celebrate our religions.
– ND
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