INTERNATIONAL LATIN POP SINGER EL DASA TO JOIN SINGER MARÍA ELENA MACÍAS, TRIO ELLAS, JACKY IBARRA, ADRIAN CRUZ AND MARIACHI LOS TOROS FOR CATHEDRAL’S CELEBRATION IN HONOR OF OUR LADY OF GUADALUPE, DEC. 11
December 4, 2014  |  By:   |  Press Releases  |  

-Annual celebration to feature folkloric dances, art projections, and veneration of the only relic in the U.S. of the tilma of St. Juan Diego on which the miraculous image of Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared-

The annual celebration in honor of Our Lady of Guadalupe presented by the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels and the Knights of Columbus will be held on the eve of her Feast Day, December 11, starting at 6 p.m. and culminating with a midnight Mass at 12 a.m. on December 12. This year’s musical tribute will include special guest singers Adrian Cruz, María Elena Macías, El Trio Ellas, Jacky Ibarra and El Dasa.

The festivities will begin at 6 p.m. with folkloric dancers on the Cathedral Plaza, followed by the Cathedral Aztec dancers’ homage to the Blessed Mother. There will also be special video projections on the plaza of artwork of the Virgin of Guadalupe by artist Lalo Garcia. During this time, faithful will be invited to venerate the tilma of St. Juan Diego, the only relic in the United States of the cloth where the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe miraculously appeared. At 10 p.m., the celebration moves inside the Cathedral for a Rosary, a mariachi concert by Mariachi Los Toros and a musical tribute with guest singers invited to serenade the Virgin and sing “Las Mañanitas,” a traditional Mexican birthday song to honor the Virgin on her Feast Day. Midnight Mass will be presided by Archbishop José H. Gomez.

The Cathedral Celebration in honor of Our Lady of Guadalupe is co-presented by the Knights of Columbus, the world’s largest Catholic fraternal organization, whose devotion to Our Lady of Guadalupe reached a milestone with the chartering of their first Mexican council as the “Guadalupe Council” in Mexico City in 1905. Since then, the Knights have spread Our Lady’s message, co-sponsoring a U.S. tour of the Archdiocese’s tilma relic in 2003, holding the first International Marian Congress on the Feast Day of Our Lady of Guadalupe in 2009, and a special Guadalupe Celebration in 2012 at the historic Los Angeles Coliseum, with more than 80,000 faithful in attendance. Founded in 1882 by Venerable Father Michael McGivney in New Haven, Conn., the Knights of Columbus has grown over 1.8 million members and 14,000 councils in more than a dozen countries worldwide.

The festivities are also made possible by the support of the Catholic Communication Collaboration (C3), Guadalupe Radio, El Gallo Giro Traditional Mexican Kitchen, and Amapola Deli and Market.

The celebration recalls the miraculous apparitions of the Virgin Mary to Saint Juan Diego at Tepeyac, Mexico, in December 1531, when she left her image on his tilma or cloak. A relic or piece of the tilma kept in the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels was a present to the Archdiocese of Los Angeles from the Archbishop of Mexico City in appreciation and friendship after Los Angeles Archbishop John J. Cantwell led a pilgrimage to the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City in the early 1940s. Given the natural agave fibers used to make the tilma, experts say it is miraculous that the relic at the Cathedral in Los Angeles, and the rest of the tilma in Mexico City, have survived for almost five centuries. For more information regarding the celebrations to honor the Virgin of Guadalupe visit archla.org/guadalupe.
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