In December 1531 on the hill of Tepeyac in what is present-day Mexico City an Indian named Juan Diego beheld an apparition of the Mother of God. With the attire and features of an Indian maiden and addressing Juan Diego in his native tongue she instructed him to tell the bishop to build a shrine on that spot. As a sign she left her image on his cloak - the miraculous image of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Drawing on a lifetime of reflection Father Virgil Elizondo has written Guadalupe, an account of the story and meaning of one of the most powerful religious symbols of our day. For centuries Guadalupe has served as one of the sustaining symbols of Mexican, Latin American, and U.S. Hispanic identity and spirituality. But more than that, in this lyrical and inspiring work Elizondo shows that Our Lady of Guadalupe has an even wider significance and relevance to the church universal at the dawn of a new millennium.

The groundbreaking work in Hispanic theology, relates the story of the Galilean Jesus to the story of a new mestizo people.

In this work, which marked the arrival of a new era of Hispanic/Latino theology in the United States, Virgilio Elizondo described the "Galilee principle": "What human beings reject, God chooses as his very own". This principle is well understood by Mexican-Americans, for whom mestizaje -- the mingling of ethnicity, race, and culture -- is a distinctive feature of their identity. In the person of Jesus, whose marginalized Galilean identity also marked him as a mestizo, the Mexican-American struggle for identity and new life becomes luminous.

This is a powerful, first-hand account of a religious ministry that reaches out to console, heal, and build the lives of poor and desperate immigrants who come to the United States in search of a better life. Daniel G. Groody talked with immigration officials, 'coyote' smugglers, and immigrants in detention centers and those working in the fields. The picture that emerges starkly contrasts with the negative stereotypes about Mexican immigrants: Groody discovered insights into God, family, values, suffering, faith, and hope that offer a treasury of spiritual knowledge helpful to anyone, even those who are materially comfortable but spiritually empty. This book has a message that reaches across borders, divisions, and preconceptions; it reaches all the way to the heart.