Pope Leo XIV receives Amazonian image of Mary and hears of new shrine in Manaus
Catholics from the Archdiocese of Manaus gave Pope Leo XIV a wooden statue of Mary and the Child Jesus with indigenous features during a September 7 audience at the Vatican
Pope Leo XIV received Cardinal Pedro Ricardo Barreto Jimeno SJ, former president of the Ecclesial Conference of the Amazon (CEAMA), in a private audience at the Apostolic Palace at the Vatican on September 7, 2026. The cardinal was accompanied by Jesuit priest Adelson Araújo dos Santos, a native of Manaus and a professor at the Pontifical Gregorian University.
The pope received a gift from the Catholics of the Our Lady of the Amazon Mission Area, part of the Archdiocese of Manaus in Brazil's Amazonas region. The gift was an image of the Mother of Jesus holding the Child in her arms, both with indigenous features. The image is meant to honor the indigenous peoples and traditional communities who live across much of the Amazon, where an estimated three million people live, spread across some 390 ethnic groups throughout the Pan-Amazon region, which covers eight countries.
The small wooden statue reproduces an original painting by the Amazonian artist Lara Denys, whose work sets out to reflect the reality and culture of the region's peoples. It shows the Virgin Mary and the Child Jesus with Amazonian features, including skin darker than in the traditional images brought by colonizers and the first European missionaries. Mary wears a mantle inspired by the art of the Waimiri-Atroari peoples and is held up by a victoria regia, a plant common in Amazonian rivers and lakes.
Pope Francis also received a painting of Our Lady of the Amazon during the Synod on Synodality. That painting was brought from Manaus by Araújo dos Santos and presented to Francis together with Cardinal Leonardo Steiner, the current archbishop of Manaus and president of CEAMA.
Accepting the gift with thanks, Leo XIV said he was glad to learn that a new Marian shrine is being built in Manaus in honor of Our Lady of the Amazon. The design is intended to incorporate elements of the region's animal and plant life and of its indigenous traditions.
