On December 12, 1531, a decade after the Spanish conquered the Aztec Empire, the Virgin Mary was supposed to have appeared before an indigenous man named Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin on a hilltop named Tepeyac. She caused the hilltop to bloom with out-of-season roses, so he could convince the Spanish bishop of Mexico to build a shrine for her. Juan Diego went to the bishop, opened his cloak, and the roses tumbled out, revealing an image of the Virgin Mary inside his cloak. Today, a portrait of the Virgin Mary lies inside the Basilica of Guadelupe, and it is the most visited Catholic pilgrimage site in the world, drawing about 20 million visitors a year. The portrait has survived the humidity of Mexico City, as well as a blast from a bomb planted by an anti-Catholic radical in 1921. The Virgin of Guadelupe is a national symbol of Mexico, and represents the merging of the Aztec and Spanish cultures. Many scholars believe that she replaced an earlier Indigenous object of worship, the Aztec mother goddess Tonantzin, who was worshipped in the same area long before the arrival of the Spanish. --- Source: https://theculturetrip.com/north-america/mexico/articles/basilica-de-guadalupe-heres-why-this-is-the-most-visited-catholic-pilgrimage-site-in-the-world/