Started in August 2007, the inauguration of the oratory dedicated to Our Lady of  Guadalupe by the Catholic Spanish Speaking Community in Melbourne was held on the 7th December 2007. The chapel was blessed  by His Lordship Bishop Hilton Deakin. Holy Mass was concelebrated with Rev Fr. Delmar Da Silva and  various members of the Clergy under the cheerful eyes of a large Spanish community singing serenades and Marian hymns to Our Lady.

Traditional accounts tell that the peasant Juan  Diego saw at the Hill of Tepeyac, near Mexico City, a vision of Virgin Mary, surrounded by lighting in the early morning of December 9, 1531 When ordered to ask the “lady” for a     miraculous sign to prove her identity, She told him to gather flowers from the top of Tepeyac Hill. There he found Castilian roses, not native to Mexico, on the normally barren hilltop. The roses were arranged  in his peasant tilma cloak and brought before Bishop Zumárraga on December 12, the flowers fell to the floor, and in their place on the fabric was the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, miraculously imprinted there

The icon is Mexico’s most popular religious and cultural image, bearing the titles “Queen of  Mexico”, “Patroness of the Americas”, “Empress of Latin America”, and “Protectress of Unborn Children”

The Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe is celebrated each year on the 12th December and is a very popular event hosted by the Hispanic community at the Shrine. They come by busloads from all corners of Victoria. The day starts with the Rosary where the Icon of Our Lady is carried out while the devotees would accompany her with beautiful Marian hymn and serenades.