v/ el salvador

The exaltation and worship...

of the Blessed Virgin Mary of the Poor in Zacatecoluca, El Salvador... 

dates back to 1840, when a dry lightning set fire to a ranch, and it was feared that the entire town would burn. The people, crying, shouted to the Blessed Virgin to put out the fire. And the miracle was done, a torrential rain began to fall and the fire was extinguished. 

It was August 15, 1840. 

The feast of the Virgen del Tránsito [Dormition].

That day, Friar Félix Castro asked the people... 

to surrender to Her every year, thanking Mary for such a great miracle received. 

The party promised to María de los Pobres was set for December 26... 

and up to this day no year has stopped being celebrated. 

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There have been three images of the Virgin of the Poor. 

The first arrived in 1573 from Guatemala... 

with the 40 Spanish families that founded Zacatecoluca.

The image was owned by the Yúdice and Hiterburúa family, brought from Spain by Fray Rodrigo Lagrada in 1533. This image is currently worshiped as Virgen del Tránsito.

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The second image was bought in Guatemala... 

with alms from the towns of the department in 1825, at the initiative of the brothers Miguel and Benigno Yúdice. This image was partially burned when parishioners lit candles very close to the image in the middle of the last century.

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And the image that is paraded year after year...w

as brought from Guatemala in 1850 by the Guirola family.

In the year 1854, the Guirola family invited Monsignor Tomás Pineda y Zaldaña, second Bishop of El Salvador, for the solemn blessing of the image in the presence of the then President of the Republic General José María San Martín, accompanied by his wife and other members of his cabinet, as well as hundreds of parishioners from all over the country.

On that occasion the Bishop proclaimed the Virgin Mary of the Poor, Patron of the Department of La Paz and ordered that her feast be every December 26.

[wiki]