Is a Virgin on your Christmas list?

Seems like this is the case for some people this year. Items range from ashtrays, key chains, baseball caps to shower curtains, candles, ornaments, aprons, to kimono robes and belt buckles. Give your loved one a "Who's your Virgin?" T-shirt for $36 and accessories it with a $154 virgin ring.

The Virgin is Our Lady of Guadalupe. She has become the latest fad, a *pop icon.* She had been seen with Gwen Stepani and Britney Spears. Even on the soccer field, David Beckman wears her image on T-shirts. Not all is happy in *Virginland* though. Many Catholics and Catholic priests find this wave of popularity as irreverent. They say people are just cashing in on her popularity and they don't know who she is or what she stands for. Maybe if they knew her message of concern for the poor and the outcast they wouldn't be so quick to hear the ca-ching of the cash coming in or wear her image.

Today is an important day, not only in Mexico, but also here in the U.S. where the Latin influence is abundant. Today marks the day in 1531 that Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared to Juan Diego at Tepeyac near Mexico City. She appeared to him, as the story goes, at dawn, speaking to him in his native Indian tongue and told him to build a church on the hill. She made the out of season roses bloom as proof that she really did appear to him. When Juan Diego unrolled his cloak before the bishop at Mexico City, the roses fell out, but her image remained on the cloak. The cloak can still be seen today. It resides in the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe. You can read more of her story at http://www.mexconnect.com.

Her image is a mixture of the native Indian beliefs and the Catholic religion of the Virgin Mary. She is the symbol of hope, liberation and compassion. Today, there will be Masses, mediations, and marichais.

So, if a Virgin is on your list, at least now you know alitlle about her.