Founded in 1701, the same week as Detroit’s founding, Ste. Anne de Detroit Catholic Church originally began as a French congregation with the arrival of Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac and 100 fellow Frenchmen and 100 Algonquian Native Americans establishing Fort Pontchartrain du Detroit. The demographic of the church shifted around the Great Depression to mostly Irish settling in what is known as Corktown because they came from County Cork, Ireland. In the 1950s, Detroit became one of the wealthiest cities in the country due to the big three which then brought a large migration from Latin communities coming for jobs.
Today, the area around Ste. Anne’s is so heavily influenced by Latin culture that it has been coined as Mexicantown. Director of Ste. Anne's, Monsignor Kosanke, credits the Latin American community for saving the Ste. Anne de Detroit church from closure especially in the 60s and 80s.
One such family who has made Ste. Anne church their spiritual home is the Hernandez family who immigrated from Jalisco, Mexico for a better life beginning with their grandfather and great uncle. The father, Felipe Hernandez, and his brother then immigrated to Detroit when Felipe was just 17 years old after their cousins established themselves here. Felipe stayed with a friend that was living above the Honey Bee Market or La Colmena — a well-known Latin American market in Mexicantown. With a love of music and faith, Felipe, his brother, and cousins sang in the Ste. Anne’s choir. Today, the family has four generations of lineage attending Ste. Anne’s with 25 members of the immediate family in Detroit.
Felipe’s daughter, Roxanna, talked about the difficulties of experiencing a sense of belonging as a foreigner in the United States but having the community at Ste. Anne’s and Mexicantown have been special for the family. For the Hernandez family and many Latin Americans, family is everything, and every celebration starts with a mass, including birthdays, quinceaneras, weddings, holidays; the church is always involved. Family, faith, and especially food are essential to every celebration.
One special celebration the family attends each year on December 12th is the Feast Day of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Lady Guadalupe or Mary, mother of Jesus, is a highly celebrated saint in the Latin faith — so highly celebrated that her depiction is seen in almost every home, business and anywhere you go in Mexico.
According to the Hispanic tradition, Our Lady of Guadalupe, or the Virgin Mary, appeared to an Aztec man, Juan Diego, as an Aztec woman herself, and requested that Diego have a shrine built in the spot where she appeared, Tepeyac Hill, located in a suburb of Mexico City. The local bishop demanded that Diego show proof of her appearance in order to build the church. Lady Guadalupe appeared to Diego again, instructing him to pick roses to take to the Bishop as proof even though it was winter. Diego miraculously was able to pick roses and put them in his cloak (tilma). When he visited the bishop to show him the roses, dozens of them fell to the floor and his cloak revealed a picture of the Virgin Mary that had not been there previously. The stunned bishop then ordered the church to be built in her honor on Tepeyac Hill.
Since this miraculous event 500 years ago, the cloak has been analyzed by scientists and experts that say there is no scientific explanation for how the design appeared. Lady Guadalupe is on the side of those that are oppressed, immigrants, mothers, indigenous groups, social justice, hope, and the most important symbol in the Hispanic faith.
At Ste. Anne’s, the Feast Day of Our Lady of Guadalupe begins early in the morning with a traditional song, Las Mañanitas, which is used to honor a loved one on their birthday, a saint's day, and other important holidays. Following the song is a traditional dance called Matachines, rosary, then a breakfast with coffee and Mexican sweet bread. In the evening, there is a Mass in Spanish by Father John Herman, a Mariachi band, a traditional dance, a reenactment of the story of Juan Diego and Our Lady of Guadalupe, and a celebratory dinner. The mariachi and the many traditions involved in this celebration are not just a style of music or style of cooking or dance but an emblem of their Latin cultural heritage and a connection to their homeland.
Felipe Hernandez plays the guitar and still sings in the choir decades later while the granddaughter, Camille walks in the procession. Thank you to the Hernandez family and Ste. Anne de Detroit for allowing us to attend this beautiful celebration.