Conceptionist Convent of Quito · Ecuador · 1594–1634
In a cloistered convent in colonial Quito, high in the Andes, a Spanish nun named Mother Mariana de Jesús Torres received a series of visits from Our Lady that lasted forty years and warned, in remarkable detail, of the trials the Church would face in the twentieth century. The image she was asked to commission — Our Lady of Good Success — has remained on the same convent altar ever since 1611, mostly unseen by the world, beloved by a small Conceptionist community.
Mother Mariana and the Hidden Image
Mother Mariana de Jesús Torres y Berriochoa, a Spanish foundress of the first Conceptionist convent in the Americas, lived in Quito from 1577 until her death in 1635. She was, by her sisters’ testimony, an extraordinary mystic — and during a long life of prayer, the Mother of God appeared to her many times.
In one of her most beloved apparitions, Mary asked that an image be made — herself crowned, the Christ Child in her arms, a crozier in her hand — under the title “Our Lady of Good Success.” The image was sculpted, the convent records say, with miraculous help. It has remained on the altar of the convent’s upper choir since 1611. The convent is cloistered; the image is rarely seen, but the Conceptionist sisters have continued the prayer of Mother Mariana for four centuries.
Mother Mariana also recorded prophecies of difficult times for the Church — for the family, the priesthood, the morals of nations — that she said would come to a head in the twentieth century. The faithful in Ecuador and beyond have read those prophecies in many ways; the Church has not pronounced upon them all. What is unquestioned is that the convent itself has remained a place of prayer for the Church, generation upon generation, and that the image of Our Lady of Good Success is honored as a treasure of the Andes.
The Sanctuary Today
The Conceptionist Convent of the Immaculate Conception in Quito is part of the historic center of the colonial city — a great UNESCO World Heritage Site. The convent is enclosed; the image is on view only at certain hours and on certain feast days. Pilgrims who come find a small chapel within the larger convent, and there, Mary, robed and crowned, smiles down upon them as she has smiled down upon four hundred years of South American Catholic life.
The cult of Our Lady of Good Success has spread far beyond Quito in recent decades — to Mexico, to the United States, to the Philippines. But the original image, where Mother Mariana asked it to be, remains in her convent, in the prayers of her sisters, in the heart of a city that has called her her own.
A Prayer at Good Success
Our Lady of Good Success,
hidden in a high Andean convent
for four hundred years of unseen prayer —
teach us the dignity of the hidden life.
When our work is small and our witness is unwatched,
let us, like Mother Mariana, pray for the whole Church.
And grant us, in the difficulties of our age,
the quiet success that is your name. Amen.
Live from Quito
The Conceptionist Sisters of Quito are a cloistered community whose principal life is the choir office and the Mass. Major celebrations from the historic center of Quito are broadcast on Ecuadorian Catholic media; the contemplative life continues, day and night, behind the convent wall.
Visit & Learn More
- Our Lady of Good Success (overview): en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Our_Lady_of_Good_Success
- Wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Our_Lady_of_Good_Success
Journey with Mary: A Path to Jesus 