An Event That Marked a Community
This March 29 marks 48 years since the Marian apparition of the Virgin of Peace, a religious event recorded in Huejutla de Reyes, Hidalgo. The small chapel dedicated to this devotion is located in the traditional Tahuizán Neighborhood, between Allende and Aldama streets, and holds the memory of an event that, at the time, gathered the faith of numerous devotees.
The Facts According to Local Tradition
According to the testimony collected at the time by Mr. Armando Solís Flores, on March 29, 1977, a group of children gathering firewood on the cerro de la pulpa seca—an area that today corresponds to the Rojo Gómez neighborhood—became embroiled in a verbal dispute with another group of youths due to religious differences. During the argument, his brother Roberto picked up a stone with the intention of throwing it, but heard a sweet voice behind him ordering them to stop the fight.
When he turned to identify the source of the voice, he discovered that on a stone slab where he had been sitting moments before, the image of the Virgin Mary was clearly reflected. Upon this discovery, the children ran home to inform their parents, initiating the spread of the event.
From Devotion to Gradual Forgetfulness
The historian and writer Vicente Lara Azuara documented that, after news of the apparition, the site became a center of spontaneous pilgrimage. Many people came to the place to venerate the image reflected on the stone and leave offerings, in a movement of faith and awe that characterized the early years. Over time, and as the same historian recounts, devotion gradually declined, as did the clarity of the image on the rock.
Today, on the altar of the chapel later erected in the neighborhood, only an ordinary stone remains physically, a silent witness to that event. However, as local chroniclers note, the chapel itself remains a historical and religious reference for the community, a tangible point that preserves the memory of a Marian experience that marked the spiritual life of past generations in the Huejutla region.
Original source: www.zunoticia.com (published on March 9, 2025)
