Our Lady of La Leche (Spanish: Nuestra Señora de La Leche y Buen Parto; "Our Lady of the Milk and Good Delivery") is a

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

title of the

Blessed Virgin Mary Mary; arc, ܡܪܝܡ, translit=Mariam; ar, مريم, translit=Maryam; grc, Μαρία, translit=María; la, Maria; cop, Ⲙⲁⲣⲓⲁ, translit=Maria was a first-century Jews, Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Saint Joseph, Jose ...

associated with a statue of her breastfeeding the infant

Jesus Christ Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...

. It is said to be one of the oldest of all

Marian devotions Marian devotions are external pious practices directed to the person of Mary, mother of God, by members of certain Christian traditions. They are performed in Catholicism, High Church Lutheranism, Anglo-Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy and Orie ...

. Dating back to the Early Church, the image was later widely venerated by Spanish Catholics in the early modern era, some of whom brought the image and devotion to the

New World The term ''New World'' is often used to mean the majority of Earth's Western Hemisphere, specifically the Americas."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: Oxford University Press, p. ...

and what would become the United States.

History

Our Lady of La Leche is an ancient devotion to the

dating back to the time of the

Roman Empire The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post- Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediter ...

, where Christians depicted the infant Jesus nursing at Mary's breast on the walls of the Roman Catacombs, where they were known to congregate and worship. It has been traditionally associated with pregnancy and successful deliveries, for which devotees would pray with the intercession of the Blessed Virgin. The popularity of the devotion grew in Spain, especially in

Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the Largest cities of the Europ ...

in the late 16th century and eventually made its way to the

by means of Spanish settlers.

North America

Notably, a group of Spanish colonists—including free and enslaved

Afro-Spaniards Afro-Spaniards are Spanish citizens of Sub-Saharan African descent. The term may include Spaniards of Afro-Caribbean and African American descent, but often excludes Black Spaniards of Latin American origin. It almost always excludes Spaniards ...

—built a shrine to Our Lady of La Leche at Mission Nombre de Dios in St. Augustine, Florida in the early 17th century. The move arose from a call by King Philip II to construct such a shrine in Madrid, following his hearing of the devotion and reports of its results. The Florida shrine is a replica of the Spanish, the latter being destroyed in 1937 during the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebelión, link ...

Spanish explorers, under the command of Pedro Menéndez de Avilés and the spiritual chaplaincy of Fr Francisco López de Mendoza Grajales, OFM, had arrived in northern Florida in 1565. Grajalez celebrated there the first Mass in what would become the United States. The mission established there, Mission Nombre de Dios, was also the first in that regard. Today, the National Shrine of Our Lady of La Leche (built in its current form in 1915) is the oldest Catholic or

Marian shrine A shrine to the Virgin Mary (or Marian shrine) is a shrine marking an apparition or other miracle ascribed to the Blessed Virgin Mary, or a site on which is centered a historically strong Marian devotion. Such locales are often the destinatio ...

in the United States. It was canonically crowned on behalf of

Pope Francis Pope Francis ( la, Franciscus; it, Francesco; es, link=, Francisco; born Jorge Mario Bergoglio, 17 December 1936) is the head of the Catholic Church. He has been the bishop of Rome and sovereign of the Vatican City State since 13 March 2013. ...

in 2021.

References

{{Reflist

External links

National Shrine of Our Lady of La Leche (official website)
Canonical coronation Marian devotions Catholic Mariology Spanish Catholics Catholicism in the United States New Spain Spanish Florida St. Augustine, Florida Catholic Church in Florida Spanish colonization of the Americas Pre-statehood history of Florida

History

North America

See also

References

External links