A Road of Mysteries

The Basilica of Guadalupe is considered the holiest shrine in Mexico, in fact, the holiest in all of the Americas.  Millions of pilgrims come to visit the Basilica every year, many traveling long distances.  One of the roads in Mexico City along which pilgrims travel is the "Calzada de los Misterios" (The Causeway of Mysteries).  

The road was originally a causeway which connected the Aztec capital, located in the middle of Lake Texcoco, with the mountain of Tepeyac where a temple to the mother goddess Tonantzín was located.  Pilgrims would travel the causeway to visit the temple. Later, after the Spanish conquest, it was at the same mountain where the Virgin of Guadalupe supposedly appeared, and at the mountain's foot a basilica was built in her honor.  Catholic pilgrims continued to use the same route that the Aztec worshipers had used before them.  Over time, the lake was drained away, and today the "Calzada de los Misterios" runs a distance of about 2.5 miles from the end of the Paseo de la Reforma to the Basilica.

Last week I decided to walk the length of the avenue.  I took the Metrobus that runs along the Paseo de la Reforma to the stop at the beginning of "Misterios".  

At that spot there is an enormous cross, the Cross of Evangelization, which commemorates the Spanish missionaries that came to Mexico in the 16th century to convert the native population to Christianity.

Ironically, just across the avenue is a large piece of street art which is definitely not Catholic in inspiration.  It features the Aztec god of fire, Huehueteotl.

The road is named after the "mysteries of the rosary", fifteen episodes from the Bible upon which one is supposed to meditate while reciting the rosary.  Beginning in 1675,  Baroque monuments were built along the route.  Each one represented one of the those "mysteries".  Pilgrims on the way to the Basilica would stop at the monuments as they recited each "mystery of the rosary".  Over time, some of the structures were destroyed, but eight of the original "mysteries" remain along the avenue.  They were spruced up and repainted for one of Pope John Paul's visits to Mexico City.  Sadly, however, many of them are now defaced with graffiti.

  

Many of the statues of saints which were in the niches of the "mysteries" are either broken or missing. 

 

The carvings which depict the Biblical scenes have also eroded to the point where many are unrecognizeable.

I think that this one portrays Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane while the apostles sleep.

In 1999 for a Papal visit, the "mysteries" that had been destroyed were replaced with new ones.  It is obvious which ones are replacements, and it is easier to tell which Bible story they represent.

Along the avenue many jacaranda trees have been planted.  It is now the season for them to begin to bloom.

This poinsettia which has grown to the size of a small tree, is still blooming.

 

This rather primitive copy of Michelangelo's "The Creation of Adam" decorates a wall along the road.

A street mural honors two local residents who disappeared in 2019.

A statue of the landscape painter José María Velasco is missing a hand.

The final 'mystery" along the pilgrims' route is an original from the colonial era.

It portrays the coronation of the Virgin.

Just beyond this last monument, the avenue comes to an end at the Basiilica of Guadalupe, the goal of millions of pilgrims.  The new basilica was constructed in 1976 to replace the older church which opened its doors in 1709.