Ruth Paget: Black Madonna conference

Wednesday, May 29, 2019

The Black Madonna Phenomenon - Part 2 - by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

The Black Madonna Phenomenon – Part 2 – by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Malgorzata Oleskiwicz of the University of Texas – San Antonio researches the concept of personal geography and the role of black Madonnas in Latin American and Eastern European liberation movements.

The brown Virgen of Guadalupe figures into the “Black Madonna” pantheon according to Oleskiwicz. Filming religious ceremonies of Brazilian descendants of Yoruban slaves from Western Africa (primarily modern-day Nigeria), Oleskiwicz was struck by how similar the iconography and religious practices were between Yoruban and Polish worshipers.

Why so many people are drawn to black Madonnas was discussed by Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum of the California Institute for Integral Studies and China Galland of the Graduate Theological Union. Both emphasized that we must respond to this phenomenon with academic rigor.

Birnbaum happily told the group, “Male geneticists and anthropologists have pinpointed the origin of human life in Africa. And, migrating Africans took their goddess with them.”

Galland pointed out that despite our common genetic origins, the manifestations of the black Madonna are as different as the cultures within which they develop.

For Galland, the black Madonas beckon us to defend life on Earth. She stressed that our real enemies are not people, but greed, hatred, delusion, and jealousy.

Galland encouraged participants to have everyday spiritual practices such as prayers, caring for plants, preparing family meals, and outdoor walks to bring love into our lives. These acts allow us to transform anger and act with compassion and levelheadedness.

The birth of Chicana artist Rosa M’s son prompted her to literally deconstruct the Virgen of Guadalupe down to the bones. She left only the heart inside a painting of the Virgen, wanting to pass on to her son something that would reflect both their Indian and European heritage. She left the heart to show that “We mature as individuals, when we sacrifice ourselves for others.

Anne-Marie Sayers, founder of the Costanoan Indian Research Center and chronicler of the persistence of culture offered wise remarks about resilience: When the ceremonies stop, so does the Earth.”

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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The Black Madonna Phenomenon - Part 1 - by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

The Black Madonna Phenomenon by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

In addition to reviewing restaurants for the Monterey County Weekly (Circulation: 200,000 – California’s Central Coast), I also wrote several art reviews and covered the 9^th annual Virgen of Guadalupe Conference organized by Dr. Jennifer Colby of California State University – Monterey Bay.

The conference was held in San Juan Bautista, California and began with an extensive discussion of the Virgen of Guadalupe and led to the topic of Black Madonnas worldwide.

The article I wrote follows with a few edits:

Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary

The Virgen of Guadalupe’s mythic story has roots that reach back centuries and still moves believers. It begins when the Indian Juan Diego first sees the Virgen on Tepeyac Hill outside Mexico City, a site sacred to the Aztec goddess Tonantzin.

The Virgen asks Juan Diego to have the Catholic bishop build her a shrine. When the bishop refuses, the Virgen makes Castille roses bloom in December. Juan Diego takes these to the bishop.

When Juan Diego removes the cloth holding the roses, an image of a finely featured woman with brown skin appears. She wears a blue mantle decorated with stars. A golden aureole radiates behind her.

The Virgen of Guadalupe’s influence continues to this day, and her presence radiated throughout the 9^th Annual Virgen conference that Dr. Jennifer Colby organized last weekend in San Juan Bautista, California.

Working in the fields as an activist, Colby witnessed firsthand how the Virgen galvanizes and sustains farmworkers.

Conference attendee Shirley Flores pointed out that it took the Catholic Church hundreds of years to accept the Virgen of Guadalupe as she is. Even now, the Virgen of Guadalupe occupies back chapels and is considered as “the other” Madonna.

CSU-Monterey professor Amalia Mesa-Baines summed up why we become attached to images like the Virgen of Guadalupe’s:

The spiritual belongs to us at all moments. She is everywhere. But, when we are weak, we need an icon. The icon is not the spirit, but it calls it up.

Mesa-Baines added that the Virgen functions through geography. Virgin sightings happen near trees, rivers, and circles of stones. We make pilgrimages to these sites. Local shrines are erected where an accident or death occurred. A picture of the Virgen always decorates these spots.

End of Part 1.