The Meme that Outraged Catholics AND Protestants

The Viral Meme and the Catholic Response

So, this meme was explosive, with millions of views across multiple platforms in a day. It's a stock image of a man stepping in something and saying, oh man, I stepped in something pagan. In the next frame, he lifts up his shoe, and it's a smudged image of Our Lady of Guadalupe.

This was after the What videos on Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of Guadalupe, in which it was shown that neither apparition could have been the Virgin Mary. Incredibly, the outrage was not just from Roman Catholics.

Cartoonist Jeff Larson said, not funny, and I am not Catholic. Political commentator Calvin Robinson said, what is wrong with you, and said I was leading people away from Jesus. Anglican writer J. Brandon Meeks called me a cad.

Why the Guadalupe Apparition Cannot Be Mary

No gentleman insults a man's mother. No Christian denigrates the mother of God. It just goes to show how culturally accepted these myths have become. This is not the mother of Jesus. Our Lady of Guadalupe was either an elaborate hoax, or a demonic apparition, or both.

It cannot be argued in any biblically credible sense that this was really Mary. The legend goes that this visibly pregnant spirit appeared to a peasant named Juan Diego, and introduced herself as the ever-virgin, Holy Mary, mother of the true God.

She said she wanted a temple built to her, and people to pray to her. The real Mary would never do this. Scripture says that one who inquires of the dead is an abomination to the Lord. To prove herself, she miraculously imprinted her image on the inside of Diego's cloak, now hanging in the temple built in her honor.

Idolatry, Vain Images, and the Honor Due to Mary

Many other myths surround this image, though it is likely the creation of 16th century artist Marco Cipac D 'Aquino. The image is unquestionably man-made. It is dishonoring of Mary to say this spirit was her, and blasphemous to suggest this apparition is carrying the Son of God.

This is what people should be upset about. People crawl on their knees to this image and ask it to bless them, because they've stepped in something pagan. Jonah 2 .8 -9 says those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love, but I with the voice of thanksgiving will sacrifice to you.

Salvation belongs to the Lord, when we understand the text.