New York Times, Sunday Sept. 8, 1996
Doubting Keeper of Mexico Miracle to Exit
MEXICO CITY, Sept. 7 (Reuters)
--- A Mexican Priest who cast doubt on whether the country's beloved Virgin of Guadalupe
actually appeared in 1531 has resigned as abbot of the holy site where devotees say the
miracle took place.
Monsignor Guillermo Schulemburg created an uproar in this fervently Catholic nation
when he said in May that the apparition of Mary, the mother of Jesus, was a symbolic event
that never took place.
Many Mexican Catholics called for him to step down.
Monsignor Schulemburg, however, said when his resignation was announced on Friday
that it was not related to the controversy.
"It was spontaneous," the 80-year-old monsignor said. "It was not due to any pressure,
not at any level, not of any kind. At my age, I should dedicate myself to other
things."
In 1963, Pope John XXIII gave him the lifelong appointment as abbot of the Basilica de
Guadalupe, where according to local beliefs, a dark-skinned virgin appeared before the
humble Juan Diego in a miracle considered sacred by Mexicans.
Juan Diego was beatified, a major step toward sainthood, by Pope John Paul II in
1990.
Monsignor Schulemburg said in the interview, published in the local Catholic magazine
Ixthus, that Juan Diego "Is a symbol, not a reality."
See Also:
Mexico reacts
Pilgrimage and the Virgen de Guadalupe (Horizons96)