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Our Lord of Miracles of Guadalajara de Buga Nuestro Señor de Los Milagros de Buga
Lord of Miracles
Venerated in	Roman Catholic Church
Major shrine	Basilica of Our Lord of Miracles, Buga City, Colombia
Feast	14 September
Attributes	Crucified Christ in agony, gilded crown of thorns, silver and platinum cross, embroidered clothes
Patronage	Miracles, Colombian Armed Forces, desperate situations, impossible causes

Our Lord of the Miracles of Guadalajara of Buga (Spanish: Nuestro Señor de Los Milagros de Buga), also known as the Lord of the Miracles (Spanish: Senor de Los Milagros), is a title associated with a famous Crucifixion of the Crucified Jesus Christ. The crucifix spontaneously appeared in the 16th centruy and it is believed that it is not the work of human hands but of divine origin. It has been housed since the 16th century in the Basilica of Our Lord of the Miracles in Guadalajara de Buga City.

This minor Basilica is the most famous Catholic non-Marian sanctuary in the Americas, The redemptorist monastic community that curates also promotes the veneration a reproduction of the Cretan icon of our Lady of the Perpetual help.

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In the same decade as the apparition of the Queen of the Mountain, in 1573 an official Catholic account authorizes in September 1573, the construction of a Hermitage next to the place of Buga, where a cult had sprung up to worship "the Lord of Waters", a crucified Christ that supposedly had miraculously appeared on the shores of the Guadalajara River (also called Piedras River).

The apparition occurred in the western Colombian Cauca's valley to an elderly native Andean woman. In the 1550s, the very foundation years of the Spanish settlement, this woman, possibly a surviving Buga aborigine, earned her living by washing the laundry of different families in the Guadalajara river. The laundress, whose actual identity remains unknown, dreamed of owning a finely constructed crucifix imported from Quito to use to praise God in her simple wooden hut. She was one of the aborigines who had received Christian instruction from members of the FuenMayor family, which had acted as their encomenders. The FuenMayor family is considered the actual founder of the definitive Spanish settlement of Guadalajara de Buga.

The laundress crossed the river on foot, traveling to the center city of Guadalajara de Buga, a city located at that time on the other shore, to visit shops and inquire after a crucifix of the quality she was seeking. She discovered that such a crucifix cost around 70 reales (the Spanish currency of that time) and had to be imported as far as from Equator or Peru, if not from Spain, since it was not manufactured in Colombia. Learning the price of the crucifix, the woman returned home and began economizing money from her meager salary for several months in order to purchase it. Finally when she has saved enough, she headed back to the shop to place the order. While on her way to the city she encountered police officials escorting a neighbor, another Buga aborigine, whom she had seldom met before. He was to be imprisoned for owing a debt of exactly seventy (70) reales to a well known loan shark of the region. Not wishing to see the man go to jail, the good woman paid his debt with the money she had economized for the purchase of the fine crucifix. She then returned to her humble laundry work in the river. Some days after, while she was washing laundry, she spotted a brilliant small object being carried upstream by the current in the middle of the river. She caught it up and discovered that it was tiny crucifix. She was so happy with her find that as soon as she arrived to home she made an altar using a common wooden box for the small Christ.

One night she heard strange noises coming from the altar box of the crucifix. It was obvious that the wood was splintering. She was astonished to see that the box had been broken by the crucifix which was quite simply growing inside. The news of the miraculous event spread along all the Cauca River valley and many people started to gather at the place, where a hermitage was built, turning the humble house into a sanctuary. A wealthy family in the region decided to donate lands to build a great church, the first Hermitage, in the place of its finding to venerate the holy crucifix that was grown from a pocket size to human body proportions and that was already called the lord of Miracles. A great obstacle to facilitate the peregrination to the sanctuary was the fact that there was no bridge to cross this relatively big stream, but accounts of the epoch said that after some collective acts of prayer during the raining season a natural phenomenon took place to fix such issue. During strong rains the River suddenly changed its original path and moved in a way that its new bed became many meters distant from the old one, leaving the Hermitage located in the same side of the city.

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Guadalajara de Buga, which is the city´s formal name, is one of the oldest cities in Colombia; founded in 1555 under the order of the Spanish conquistador Sebastián de Belalcázar and known as "Buga la Real" ("the Royal Buga") or『La Ciudad Señora』(“the Lady City”). It was home to many wealthy families coming from Spain and settling in the New World.

King Philip II of Spain gave Guadalajara de Buga its city status officially at the end of the 16th century and granted its coat of arms for the many services rendered to the crown. For the first fifty years of the veneration of the Lord of Miracles sanctuary, the image was kept in a small hermitage aside the river in the place it was originally found by the elderly laundress. It suffered a gradual darkening that was attributed to the smog of candles used to enlighten the place. Also the cross was deteriorated since many people had broken off bits of the crucifix as personal mementos. By 1605 a special inspector of the Roman Catholic church sent by the Bishop of Popayan, who was worried about the popular stories concerning the miraculously appeared Christ. He feared an accusation of schism by the Holy inquisition and using the excuse that he found the quality of the image so degraded by the handling of the pilgrims who had broken off pieces he decided to burn it. A special attempt to destroy the crucifix by great fire. But the crucifix didn't burn. Instead it transpired a lot of oily liquid which the devotes wiped up with small pieces of cotton.

The pieces of cotton which had touched the image while it was in the fire reportedly produced many miraculous cures when they were used to touch ill people of the region. This lead to more fame for the sanctuary. As a consequence of the attempt of burn the image, the skin Christ turned from light olive color to a darker one that is currently has. In September–October 1757 the Bishop of Popayán, Diego del Corro, visited Guadalajara de Buga, to witness personally the existence of the image and decided to collect all documents concerning it to so as to prepare a case to be sent to Lima, Peru, the official site of the Inquisition tribunal.

From the 1700s thru the 1900s, three different hermitages were built at the site. Since this is the most seismically active region of western Colombia, they were all damaged by earthquakes. [4] By 1875, as the temple had experienced so much damage that the Bishop of Popayan brought in the redemptorist friars as caretakers. Shortly thereafter, many donations from the devotees were collected towards the construction of the Basilica. Four million brickets were manufactured in the city and twelve thousand arrobas of calcium used to paste them to build the walls. The work was carried out by volunteers fro; all over the region under the supervision of the priests. The formal inauguration of the temple was on 2 August 1907 with a solemn blessing ceremony in the presence of the Apostolic Nuncio, representing the Holy see, Monseñor Ragonesi and the new Archbishop of Popayán, Monseñor Antonio Arboleda, among thousands of devotes from all over the country.

On 29 April 1937, a man tried to destroy the image with a machete against the material of which the Christ was made. The image was not destroyed but the attack opened a gap in the right side of the torso, showing that it was not carved in wood as many believed but in some kind of mud.

On Sunday, 4 March 1956, the priest celebrating Mass suffered an assassination attempt, but the dagger used by the attacker became fractured in the air in three pieces in presence of many witnesses, a fact that received a lot of coverage of the press. The three pieces of the weapon are still permanently exhibited in the museum of the Basilica.

On 3 February 1969, another person attacked the image causing some damage to it, so an artisan was called to repair it and it was he who confirmed that the Christ is not carved but made of mud and grass like the one on the shores of the Guadalajara river. At present the Christ, which is an extremely famous relic not only in the region or in Colombia but in all the Andes producing dozens of miracles every year, is well protected behind bulletproof glass.

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A witness mentioned in ecclesiastic documents of that time of the miracle of the fire in 1605, when the Bishop of Popayan ordered the destruction of the image, there had been a lady named Luisa Sanchez. This could refer to the washing woman who had originally found the crucifix or possibly to one of her surviving relatives.

A testimony given to one Inquisition Visitador (inspector), in 1665, corresponds to Doña Luisa de la Espada, a daughter of one of the Buga Patriarchs that gave money to build the first Hermitage. According to her sworn statement as recorded in the archives, she swore she had seen the crucifix in placed in the fire but not burning only transpiring an oily liquid.

During the XVI and XVII the image was known among the common people of the Cauca's Valley as The Lord of the waters, but the increasing fame of the miracles obtained from its devotion changed to Lord of Miracles.

Among the first printed official accounts is the full story of the Miracle of the Guadalajara river written by Franciscan order Friar Francisco G. Rodríguez in 1819, the same year Colombia became independent of Spain. There are records showing that General Simon Bolivar visited Buga among the places he traveled across in his independence campaign for the south west of the country after the battle of Boyacá in his route to Equator. This unique Christ, modeled from materials of the western Colombian Andes receives its name from the region of Buga. During colonial times the region was populated by the aborigines called Bugas, who were violently suppressed by the Spaniards when they arrived in that region in the early 16th century.

In 1783 the rector of the Popayan seminar, and also the director of the sanctuary of Buga, with the approval of the Bishop, sent a report to Rome containing an extensive list of miracles of healing of devotes. Pope Píus VI responded this communication with 22 “breves perpetuos”, special instructions in which he granted generous indulgences to all the pilgrims that attend the sanctuary. The copy of this Pontifical document is filed in the Archives of the Basilica.

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The image is a full-length representation of a copper coloured skinned Christ, a long haired young man with high cheek-bones and cleft chin covered by curled beard. His features are visible altered by the torture suffered on the agony of the passion, and dreadlocks simply parted in the middle framing his face. He is falling, hanged from the cross, with the hands and feet pierced by strong nails. His head is slightly inclined. He has a suffering but at the same time very serene expression in his eyes.

This Christ image didn't have really a crown of thorns already modeled on it, so the devotes have added to the head a diadem made of plants of the Andes, but without thorns, and fixing on it rays of Gold with precious gems. Apparently the figure is naked, but it has been dressed along the centuries with fine embroidered cloths that are periodically changed and cover the upper legs and belly. His head has been partially covered by a diadem of plants used to make baskets or hampers in the Andean artistry and decorated with fine rays in gold and with precious stones that were donated by devotes in gratitude for the miracles attributed to Christ in its advocation of Our lord of Miracles.

Its entire cross is framed by waiving flames made of silver and platinum possibly added in between the XVII or XVIII centuries that may represent at the same time its divine nature or remember the miracle of the fire, when the image was tested by putting them in a bonfire by orders of the inquisition inspector. The base of the cross has a garden of tropical flowers made in platinum, silver and gold, showing the image also as hanging from a tree of life. All these additions in noble metals follow a millennial custom to offer votive elements in thanksgiving to the divinity for the miracles received.

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Although it has all the aspect of a wooden Colonial Christ, the figure has been discovered recently to be made actually as modeled like a very fine ceramic, with porcelain quality, from a mixture of very fine highly plastic mud and grass that correspond to the plants found in the shores of the Guadalajara river until present. There are no precedents of this same quality of porcelain work in all the art craft of the Americas. It represents a singularity never repeated again either in the Pre-Hispanic or the Colonial religious art of not only Colombia but any other place in the entire Andean region of South America.

The original color of the figure is of mysterious origin, since resemble human skin, and it was possible protected subsequently with layers of varnish for religious figures used in colonial times by artisans hired to either repair or protect the figure, although there are no records of such repairs in the church archives.

The Lord of Miracles of Guadalajara of Buga has at present the size of a short adult man (1.30 m, about 4.5 ft). It has a distinctive look that is not really European, due to the relative dark color of his skin, but definitively of a man of middle east, resembling a lot the depictions of Christ from the Holy Mandylion and Keramion, or the mount Sinai monastery:

On 5 October 2006, a team of specialists used four different complementary technologies to analyze the artifact: X rays, ultraviolet rays, pigment, and stratigraphic analysis. The analyses of the image certified its incredible well preserved condition after several centuries.

The image of the Lord of Miracles of Buga has been used in religious processions and public acts of prayer for the Peace of Colombia in particular during the grave narco-terrorist wave of violence that shocked Colombia during the second half of the 1980s and first of the 1990s. It also has been used when there are natural disasters like when earthquakes in the Andes or during strong floods produced by yearly tropical storms. [4]The Lord of the Miracles of Buga was sent on tour around to the principal cities of the country in 1993, including to the Capital Santa Fe de Bogota, as a special act of special consecration of the nation by the Roman Catholic Church that included several collective acts in which hundreds of thousands of devotes were gathered to pray for an end to internal conflict.

Our lord of Miracles had been turned to by the Catholic Church as a powerful national icon invoking peace and reconciliation on multiple occasions in Colombian history in particular calling for an end to internal national strife. An interesting parallel between the natural predisposition of the Christ of Buga to be hung out in public procession, due to its change of size and weight, and the climate of religiosity in the country. By the end of June 1902, Colombia was consecrated for the first time as a nation to the Sacred Heart of Jesus by Monsignor Bernardo Herrera-Restrepo in a church specially created for the event, El Voto Nacional, in the presence of President Jose María Sanclemente a few months before the ending of the one thousand days civil war.

In 1903, once the war was ended the Lord of Miracles of Buga went outside of the basilica for the first time in years. The solemn act of consecration remained unaltered and was continuously practiced every year, with the presence of every single President of the country up until 1994, when it was derogated by the administration of Ernesto Samper-Pizano who was accused of having financed his political campaign with money from drugs lords. In the years following, outdoor processions in Buga were interrupted. This lasted until 2004 when Cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church restored the solemn act of the consecration of Colombia to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Our Lord of Miracles of Buga was successfully exposed in solemn procession outdoors in 2007 as well as 2014.

The angular stone for the construction of the sanctuary was blessed by Ortiz, the Archbishop of Popayán. Also attending the religious ceremony was the President of the United States of Colombia, Rafael Nunez in 1886. The building of the church took more than 15 years, and was interrupted by the war of the thousand days in between 1900 and 1903, the worst civil war that ever occurred in Colombia.

The inauguration on 2 August 1907 was dedicated by the authorities of the Department regional government and representatives of the national government as well as ecclesiastic authorities. The Solemn Benediction of the Basilica was carried out by then Archbishop of Popayán, Msgr. Antonio Arboleda, on the Feast of St. Alphonsus Liguori, founder of the Redemptorist Order.

The minor Basilica is 33 meters in height, 80 meter long, and it had a French Clock installed on 18 March 1909. In between its two beautiful towers there is a statue of Christ Redemtor of 2 ½ mts of height, in melted iron. The five bells are imported from France. These are biggest church bells in Colombia. The bell called the "Miracle Maker" has a weight of 1.111 kgms; the bell called Perpetuo Socorro emits a note of Fa bemol, weighting 778 Kgms, the bell called St Therese of the Jesus Child sounds with a note of Sol, and weights 548 Kgms. The smallest bell weights 289 kgms, and the biggest (built in 1955), weighting three (3) tonnes.

The total area of the Basilica is about 2.088 square meters. The Colombian film industry has found inspiration in the apparitions to create interesting productions, such as Strategy of the Snail, a 1993 film by Jorge Cabrera, in which Misia Triana (played by actress Delfina Guido) accidentally finds the silhouette of Virgin Mary in a wall of the house in dispute.

From an anthropological point of view, the image represent an interesting mixing of the Christian religion brought by the Spaniards to South America with the cosmology characteristic of the Andean Cultures, whereby God communicates with the humans through rivers. Water streams or lakes were along thousands of years magical and mystical places of contact with the supernatural forces. The aborigines used great bodies of water as channels of communication with the great beyond, the world of the ancestors, and to pray to the divinity.[11]

In Andean Colombia there exists the legend of the Golden Man, El Dorado, an Aborigine Chibcha King who, every year, used to navigate with priests using a raft on the volcanic Guatavita lake, located over three thousand meters above sea level, carrying incredible offerings of gold to the gods to be thrown in the water. The Chibchas believed that their entire civilization came from a woman and a baby that suddenly emerged from the waters of another Andean lake in its territory.[9]

Buga is located currently in the middle of the Cauca's valley, a region that was populated in ancient times, since at least 1000 years before Christ, by some of the most advanced prehispanic Colombian civilizations: Kalima, Quimbaya, Malagana, Katios, all among the best goldsmiths of the Americas. It was Sebastian de Benalcazar, a Lieutenant of Francisco Pizarro, who, in 1555, already confirmed as governor of Cauca Province, founded Guadalajara of Buga.

Roman Catholic sources claim many miraculous and supernatural properties for the image such as the fact that the figure has maintained its structural integrity over nearly 500 years, while wooden replicas normally last only some few decades before they start to suffer degradation.

1. The washer woman found a tiny crucifix that was the size of her hand in the Guadalajara river and then it grew up to the size of a boy of 10 years old in a night. That was the first miracle.

2. In 1605, the Christ was inside while there was a fire for two days. After the fire, the crucifix started to emit oils.

3 The sudden move of the stream from its original riverbed to facilitate the peregrination of devotes coming from the city of Buga.

4. Marino A. Molina, a professional basketball sportmen who represented Colombia in the 1st Bolivarian games of 1938, was healed being 6 years old of an infection of Gangrena in his mouth that was diagnosticated as fatal and fret part of his left cheek and jaw. His mother prayed to the Novena of our Lord of Miracles of Buga.

5. Tulia M. Aldana, who became the first national bank executive woman of Colombia in 1949 (Almagran), was healed by 1930 of a tumor in her right groin that was diagnosticated as maligne by physicians who recommended to use surgery on it, without any treatment after prayers of her grand mother to Our lord of Miracles of Buga.

6. A worker in a mine in Peru had an accident losing his speech and sight, he prayed to this Christ and he was healed.

7. Romelio Cosio recovered the full motion on his legs after to have diagnosed of irreversible paraplegia by Physicians. This miracle happened when he was in prayer in front of the Crucifix, he literally left his crutches and start to walk normally without them.

8.Teresa Moreno had a nervous chronic spasm or tic that didn't allow her to talk or eat normally, after she prayed to this Christ she was healed.

9. A boy of the Amazonic region of Caqueta was born with a severe infection in his lungs and in spite of the diagnostics of physicians that will soon die he survived, he was healed after prayers to this Christ.

10. In 2005, a youngster from Cundinamarca, Andean Colombia, suffered an accident that left her in a coma. After some months of prayer by her family using Our Lord of Miracles novena she recovered consciousness.

11. Having as witness a priest, Fr. Guillermo Giraldo, a man who had been diagnosed with brain death by physicians returned literally to life. His wife prayed to this Christ.

12. After three years praying the Novena to Our Lord of the Miracles of Buga, Marina Benítez became mother, she was diagnosed as sterile by physicians.

13 José Luna is a devote that traveled from Mexcico to Buga to give thanks to Our Lord of Miracles of Buga to be healed of his spine, after been lying in bed for 4 years.

Several Pontiffs have granted recognitions to the venerated image, namely the following:

• Pope Pius VI: In 1783, Pope Píus VI in response to a report of miracles occurred in the Sanctuary of Buga, with 22 “breves perpetuos”, gave special instructions granting generous indulgencies to all the pilgrims that attend the sanctuary. The copy of this Pontific document is filed in the Archives of the Basilica.
• Pope Pius VIII: In 1819, the Roman Catholic Church officially approved the Novena of the Lord of Miracles of Buga, designed by the Franciscan Fray Francisco G. Rodríguez, as a devotion offered by all that suffer disparate situations or try to defend impossible causes, in particular to overcome incurable diseases.
• Pope Pius XI: On 23 June 1937, Pope Píus XI granted to the sanctuary the title of minor Basilica. This decree was applied by Cardinal Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli (later Pope Píus XII).
• Cardinal Primado of Colombia, Pedro Rubiano: On 2 August 2007 he presided the solemne mass of celebration of the first 100 years of the Basilica of Our lord of Miracles of Buga.

The annual festivities in honor of the Lord of Miracles of Buga (Colombia)in 2014 were extraordinary, as three special events that the Redemptorist friars, that have administrated the Basilica along all its existence, and the Pilgrims had celebrated:

• First, the 130 years since the arrival of the Redemptorist Community to the city of Guadalajara de Buga
• Second, the 75 years since it was received the title of Minor Basilica, granted to the shrine by the Holy See
• Third, 25 years of service to the pilgrims and the social works of the “Pilgrim House Foundation”

These three reasons made the days of the Novena and the Feast Day (September 5–14) and the pilgrimage of thousands and thousands of pilgrims to the Shrine/Sanctuary a sight rarely seen before.

Template:Wikipedia books

• Our lady of the Mountain
• Acheiropoieta
• Our Lady of Guadalupe

^{[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]}

1.↑ a b «Basilicas in Colombia» (en inglés). Giga-Catholic Information. Consultado el 21 de noviembre de 2008 2.↑ «Sector Histórico». Alcaldía Municipal de Guadalajara de Buga. Consultado el 21 de noviembre de 2008 3.↑ «Historia de la Basílica de Buga». Milagroso de Buga. Consultado el 21 de noviembre de 2008 5.↑ «Creer y Consumir: La industria del turismo Religioso en Guadalajara de Buga. Juan Manuel Caycedo-Atehortua Universidad Del Valle, Tesis Professional en Sociologia (October 2013)

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Our Lord of Miracles of Guadalajara de Buga (Cauca Valley).

• http://milagrosodebuga.org/index.php/el-milagroso
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcRntEX6TkQ
• http://enpazyarmonia.blogspot.com/2011/07/peticiones-al-milagroso-de-buga.html
• http://diosysantidad.blogspot.com/2013/09/senor-de-los-milagros-de-buga-colombia.html
• http://www.pscmpr.org/
• http://www.yelp.com/biz/parroquia-del-se%C3%B1or-de-los-milagros-le%C3%B3n
• https://www.flickr.com/photos/eltb/3240034353/
• http://www.cssr.com/english/scalanews/feast-of-the-lord-of-miracles-of-buga-valle-colombia/
• https://catholiccanada.wordpress.com/2008/06/09/lord-of-miracles-luke-822-56/
• http://cali-carcel.blogspot.com/2012/07/iii-cali-el-misterio-de-la-virgen-de.html
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOaLSrbg3zk
• http://variedadesdecolombia.com/basilica-de-buga.html
• http://www.eltiempo.com/archivo/documento/MAM-1515596
• http://www.cruzadacentrocultural.org/articulo-el-milagroso-de-buga
• http://www.livevalledelcauca.com/buga/basilica-del-senor-de-los-milagros.html
• http://bibliotecadigital.univalle.edu.co/bitstream/10893/7100/1/0461986-p.pdf
• http://historico.elpais.com.co/paisonline/notas/Agosto052007/basilica.html

19°29′04″N 99°07′02″W / 19.48444°N 99.11722°W / 19.48444; -99.11722