Ecclesia in America
John Paul II22 January 1999
The apostolic exhortation that Pope John Paul II signed in Mexico City on 22 January 1999 after the Synod of Bishops for America. Section 11 speaks of Our Lady of Guadalupe and extends her feast to the whole continent.
The exhortation gathers the conclusions of the Special Assembly for America of the Synod of Bishops. In section 11 the pope says that the appearance of Mary to Juan Diego on the hill of Tepeyac in 1531 had a decisive effect on evangelization, records that she is invoked as “Patroness of all America”, and accepts the bishops’ proposal that her feast be kept throughout the continent on 12 December.
It is cited here as a document of the Catholic Church’s teaching office, for the standing the Church gives to the devotion.
Cited in
- 1531, traditional date