Small pox struck and it accomplished what no conqueror was able to bring about. Nine out of every ten members of a family were struck down by this deadly plague. Everyone was helpless! Their trusted medicine men were not familiar with this sickness that threatened to annihilate 90 percent of the population. Consequently, they were helpless to stem the whirlwind kiss of death that was striking everyone in its path. The natives plunged their feverish bodies into the rivers, believing the water could heal them. Their loved ones flocked to the Rio Zahuapan, which was popularly believed to possess curative powers to heal skin diseases.

Juan Diego Bernardino enters the picture. This is not the Juan Diego to whom Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared in 1531. Juan Diego Bernardino's family was stricken with small pox. Juan went to the friars of the Franciscan Convent in Tlaxcala and asked permission to go and fetch water from the Rio Zahuapan for his relatives in Xiloxostla.

Having received his desired permission, he fetched a water jar and headed for the Rio. After he filled the jar with the alleged healing water, he rushed to his family in Xiloxostla, by way of Cerro de San Lorenzo. (St. Lawrence Mountain) Coming down from the mountain, he plodded through a thick forest filled with ocote trees, native to this area, when all of a sudden there before him was a beautiful, regal young woman.