The Ave Maria Mission: Our Declaration
We roast coffee so that more people will pray.
This is the mission behind every bag we sell. It was written before we were profitable, and it will outlast any product we make. We publish it so you can hold us to it.
We were consecrated before we were a company.
The Ave Maria Mission was born from a consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Guadalupe Roastery carries her name, her image and her question to Saint Juan Diego: Am I not here, I who am your Mother?
We answer it with our work. Everything else follows from this.
We believe an ordinary thing can become a prayer.
Coffee is one of the most ordinary things in the world. A morning, a table, a cup. We refuse to let it be only that.
In our hands it becomes an occasion for prayer, unity and mission, and we mean each of those three words.
A morning, a table, a cup. We refuse to let it be only that.
For every pound we sell, we donate a Rosary.
Not a percentage, not a pledge, not a rounding-up at checkout. One pound of coffee, one Rosary. Each one is made by hand by Catholic artisans and religious sisters who pray for the person who will receive it while they make it.
Those Rosaries go where we cannot: into hospital rooms, into prisons, into the homes of families in need, placed in their hands by the religious communities who serve at origin.
We do not sell the Rosary as a reason to buy coffee. We add it because it is the reason we roast.
One pound. One Rosary.
Made by hand. Prayed over while it is made. Placed in the hands of someone who needs it by the religious communities who serve at origin. Every bag you buy pays for the next one.
We will not build this mission on someone else's poverty.
The coffee grows on Guadalupe Farms, our own land, and on the farms of Catholic families we know by name in the highlands of Latin America. We buy from them directly, at prices that let them stay on their land and raise their children in the Faith.
We call it Catholic Trade, and 100% of our margin goes back into it.
Charity is not the model. An economy of dignified work is.
Families we know by name.
Guadalupe Farms and partner families · Latin America
We stand with those who serve the forgotten.
Religious sisters and Catholic artisans make sacred items for hospitals, prisons and communities most people never see. They were doing it before us and they will do it after us.
Our part is to keep them supplied, and to make sure every cup we sell pays for the next Rosary they place in someone's hands.
We roast the truth, not a story.
Every lot we sell is scored and stated. Every bag is roasted when you order it. You can know who grew it, who roasted it and where the margin went.
We do this because a mission with something to hide is not a mission.
Traceably Catholic is not a slogan; it is the audit we invite.
We pray what we sell.
We will not ask anyone to pray a Rosary we do not pray ourselves. The beads we give are the beads we hold.
When we fail at this, the mission fails, and we would rather be told.
In an age of noise, we choose repetition.
In an age of screens, we choose beads.
In an age of division, we choose a prayer that is shared.
The Rosary is slow on purpose. It gives a restless mind something true to rest on, fifteen minutes to a family that has none, and a prayer to the sick, the imprisoned and the lonely that they can hold in one hand.
It needs no signal, no screen and no money. It works in a hospital bed and a prison cell as well as at a kitchen table. That is why we chose it: it goes where we cannot, and it stays.
We join a line eight centuries long.
Popes, saints and ordinary families have reached for the Rosary at the decisive moments of history. We are small, and we are late, and we are grateful to be counted in.
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13th c.Saint Dominic
Tradition holds that Our Lady gave the Rosary to Saint Dominic: the life of Jesus, meditated one Hail Mary at a time. The Dominicans carried it across Europe.
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1531Tepeyac
Our Lady of Guadalupe appears to Saint Juan Diego at Tepeyac. Millions come to the Faith. Her image is on our logo; her name is on our door.
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1571Lepanto · October 7
Pope Saint Pius V asks all of Christendom to pray the Rosary. The feast of Our Lady of the Rosary is set on October 7, where it remains.
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1917Fátima
At Fátima, Our Lady asks three shepherd children the same thing at every apparition: pray the Rosary every day, for peace. She calls herself the Lady of the Rosary.
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2002Saint John Paul II
Saint John Paul II calls the Rosary “my favorite prayer,” gives the Church the Luminous Mysteries and asks families to pray it together. Our Mountain of Peace coffee carries his name.
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TodayGuadalupe Roastery
Every pound of Guadalupe coffee puts one more Rosary into the world. One decade, one cup, one family at a time.
Four hours. One Rosary. October 7, 1571.
A narrow gulf on the west coast of Greece. Two hundred and twelve galleys against nearly two hundred and eighty. Before the fleet sailed, Pope Pius V had asked Europe to pray the Rosary. He set the feast on October 7, and it is still on the calendar.
Here is the honest part: within a year the Ottomans had rebuilt the fleets, and historians still argue about what Lepanto changed. What it changed for certain was what Europe believed was possible.
And the prayer it was fought under still fits in your hand.
Hold us to it.
As long as Guadalupe Roastery roasts coffee, we will donate a Rosary for every pound we sell, we will buy from Catholic families at prices that honor their work, we will publish what is in the bag, and we will pray the beads we give. If we ever stop, you will read it here first.
“Am I not here, I who am your Mother?”