Earlier this year, I was invited to speak at CPAC Mexico, which soon became a speaking engagement at Cumbre Viva Mexico.
My husband and I used the occasion to make a pilgrimage to the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City. It wasn’t our last visit, but it easily will be the most significant. This time, I carried with me the mission of CatholicVote—and I came to place it, our mission and all of our supporters under her mantle.
In 1531, Our Lady appeared to a humble Nahuatl-speaking convert, Juan Diego, on the hill of Tepeyac.
What followed was the largest peaceful mass conversion in history. Over 30 million indigenous people embraced the Catholic faith in less than a decade. Our Lady’s tender, maternal image spoke to their hearts in a way that no one else ever could.
The Shrine today is unlike anywhere I’ve ever been. It was an ordinary Friday, a weekday, and yet 15,000 people were gathered for Mass—pilgrims from one diocese among many making an annual visit.
Nearby shops brim with life, selling food and wares to feed the great crowds she draws. And the basilica’s doors remain open, so from any angle of the plaza, her gaze is visible. As the priest said in the homily: hers is a gaze that never sleeps, eyes that never close, mothering us at every moment.
Consecrating CatholicVote to Her
Beneath the altar that holds her image, a moving walkway flows without pause. Each person gets about five to ten seconds to gaze back. But like children returning to their mother’s embrace, my husband and I stepped off, looped back, and entered again. And again. Each pass carried with it new prayers.
At that first moment, I entrusted CatholicVote to Our Lady of Guadalupe. What more fitting act is there than to give our work to the Patroness of the Americas, who once changed the course of a continent by converting hearts through her maternal witness.
Our mission at CatholicVote is to build not just a culture of life but a civilization of love. Who better to guide that work than the one who bore Love Himself into the world?
Looking Ahead
We have big plans with the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in 2026, both in Mexico and in Wisconsin. More about that soon.
As America marks its 250th year, Our Lady reminds us that our true identity is not in politics or ideology, but in the deeper call to communion and conversion. She has made herself a beautiful, unexpected part of CatholicVote’s America 250 vision. And we will walk forward under her mantle—ever mothered, ever led.
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