Apparition Of Saint Michael The Archangel - 8 May

Quoted from michaeljournal.org [1]:

     The Prince of the Heavenly Host was sent to miraculously end two horrific plagues on the same date, April 25th, centuries apart. These are the amazing stories behind the Castle of the Angels in Rome and St. Michael’s Well in Tlaxcala, Mexico.

First Apparition: The plague in Rome miraculously ended. —The Virgin Mary and St. Michael appear to Pope St. Gregory the Great.

    In the year 590, when Saint Gregory the Great was elected pope, Rome and all of Italy was in the midst of a deadly plague. In fact, Pope St. Gregory was elected because his predecessor, Pope Pelagius, had himself died of the epidemic on February 7th, 590. On April 25th, of that year, the holy pope, St. Gregory, requested a public procession through the streets of Rome to beg for an end to the epidemic. An icon of Our Lady that was painted by Saint Luke the Evangelist was carried at the head of the prayerful entourage.

    As the procession wound along the Tiber River, the Litany of Saints was intoned. At the conclusion of the litany, Saint Gregory’s gaze was drawn upwards and he suddenly saw the heavens open. Saint Michael the Archangel, along with numerous other Angels, descended above the crowd and a heavenly perfume seemingly filled the air. The angels began singing the “Regina Cœli” to the Blessed Virgin Mary, who was seated on a throne above St. Michael and the Angels.

    Completely overwhelmed by the incredible sight, Saint Gregory concluded the angelic chorus by singing out the closing lines of the Regina Cœli: “Ora pro nobis Deum, alleluia! Gaude et lætare, Virgo Maria, alleluia! Quia surrexit Dominus vere, alleluia.” (Pray for us to God, alleluia! Rejoice and be glad, O Virgin Mary, alleluia! For the Lord has truly risen, alleluia!).

    At the conclusion of the vision, the great pope witnessed Saint Michael sheathing his sword, and to the great joy of all the inhabitants, the horrific plague came to an end. The beautiful Church called Castel Sant’Angelo stands at the site where Saint Michael and his fellow angels had appeared on that day along with the Blessed Virgin Mary.

    From then on, April 25th, the date of the apparition marking the end of the plague, has become the date for the annual procession that would come to be known throughout the Catholic world as the “Greater Litanies”, since it was St. Michael along with the Angels who joined in reciting the Litanies on that day. Nowadays the “Greater Litanies” processions are sometimes called “St. Mark’s processions” because the date also coincides with the feast of St. Mark.

Second Apparition: The plague in Tlaxcala, Mexico, 1631: St. Michael appears once again during the the [sic] April 25th, “Greater Litanies” Procession.

    More than a millennium after ending the plague in Rome, and exactly 100 years after Our Lady’s apparitions to St. Juan Diego on Tepeyac Hill (Our Lady of Guadalupe, 1531), we come to the year 1631, with another Mexican apparition, which like the Romans, finds the native people of Nativitas, Tlaxcala, Mexico also ravaged by a merciless plague. The illness, called “cocolixtli” by the locals, was a horrible form of smallpox that was devastating the people with immense sufferings and numerous deaths. As had been done on April 25th, throughout the Catholic world since the time of Pope St. Gregory, the people of Tlaxcala took part in the procession of the Greater Litanies, praying for an end to the plague that was mercilessly afflicting them. It was once again at a time of great suffering that God chose to send Saint Michael to mitigate the plague.

    On this occasion, instead of appearing to a saintly Pope, the great Archangel was sent by God to manifest himself to a lowly native Indian named Diego Lázaro de San Francisco (sometimes called Diego de San Lázaro), who was only seventeen years old at the time. Towards the conclusion of the Greater Litanies procession, Diego Lázaro suddenly saw Saint Michael in a vision, and the great Archangel spoke to him in his own native language (Náhuatl) stating:

“You are to know that I am Saint Michael the Archangel, and I have come to tell you that it is the will of God and mine that you tell the inhabitants of this place, and everywhere abroad, that near a valley between two mountain ridges you will find a miraculous spring of water that will cure the people of their ills. You will find it beneath a great boulder. Do not doubt what I have told you and do not neglect what I have sent you to do.”

    As soon as St. Michael disappeared, Diego Lázaro was initially filled with holy joy. Astounded by the heavenly vision, he immediately asked others in the procession if they too had seen Saint Michael. The puzzled looks and replies of those around him made it clear he was the only one who had seen the Prince of the heavenly host. Confused, Diego Lázaro thought perhaps he imagined the whole encounter, and he decided not to tell anyone about his experience.

[1] https://www.michaeljournal.org/articles/roman-catholic-church/item/miraculous-apparitions-of-st-michael-the-archangel-rome-and-mexico, quoted without bold type; italics original.