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The Blessed Virgin Mary is most likely the best known and most celebrated woman in history. A multitude of different images of the woman recognized as the Mother of God appear all over the world.
Although not as well known, nevertheless the Spanish Senora de La Lecha y Bien parto, Our Lady of the Milk and Good Delivery, was destined to play a significant in the settlement and Christianization of the New World.
The story began in a disease-ravaged Madrid in the fourteenth century. A laborer on his way home to his dying, pregnant wife managed to relieve a troublemaker of a small wooden statue of the Virgin Mary nursing the Child Jesus as he was defaming it in the streets. Rushing home, he presented the statue to his wife and the two of them prayed to the Virgin 'for the return of health and the delivery of a healthy baby.
Not only did the woman recover, but she gave easy birth to a normal, healthy baby. The answered prayers reached the people, a miracle was proclaimed and the statue, celebrated by the King and the Church, became the object of much veneration throughout Europe. Therefore, it was not unusual that the Spanish Franciscans brought a copy of the statue with them to the settlements in the New World.
La Leche became an important evangelization tool. When the native Indians saw the Spanish men kneeling prayerfully before a woman nursing a Child, what had they to fear? The Indians had a great reverence for their children and the family. The nursing Mother signifyingly teaches the Miracle of the Incarnation; God made man born by a human woman.
When Admiral Pedro de Menendez of Avila came ashore at present day St. Augustine, he knelt before the Cross and the Indians copied his actions. It wasn't long before a small chapel was built and the Virgin of La Leche statue installed therein. The Indians became devoted to the Virgin. The first act of Christian worship was performed there on September 8 1565, the Catholic Mass of Our Lady, as it was her birthday.