{"id":64,"date":"2021-02-18T10:55:25","date_gmt":"2021-02-18T10:55:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/?p=64"},"modified":"2022-11-04T01:26:47","modified_gmt":"2022-11-04T01:26:47","slug":"senor-santo-nino-at-st-agathas-parish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/?p=64","title":{"rendered":"Se\u00f1or Santo Ni\u00f1o at St. Agatha\u2019s Parish"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Deacon Neil Daculan<\/em>
\n11 Jan. 2021<\/em><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.stagathas.org.au\/<\/a><\/p>\n

The year 2021 is very significant for us Filipinos, especially among the Catholic Christians.\u00a0 It is our 500 years of Christianity in the Philippines, and Cebu stands as the seat of Christian faith of this southeast nation.<\/p>\n

It all started in 1521 with the baptism of Rajah Humabon but most specially his wife, Hara Humamay, who in the account written by Antonio Pigafetta, the Italian chronicler of the expedition, wrote about this event:<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026she (Hara Humamay) was overcome with contrition and asked for baptism amid her tears.\u00a0 Later she asked us to give her the little Child Jesus to keep in place of her idols, and she went.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to the Cebuano historian, Resil Mojares in his book \u201cthe Feast of the Santo Ni\u00f1o: An Introduction to the History of a Cebuano Devotion,\u201d it was Ferdinand Magellan himself who gave the hara the image of the Child, \u201ctelling her to keep it in place of her idols, for it was in the memory of the Son of God.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Holy Child stayed with us through the years and for the first time in 500 years, the Santo Ni\u00f1o de Cebu has reached for the first time in the parish of St. Agatha (Cranbourne) in the Diocese of Sale.\u00a0 The novena mass started on 8 January 2021 and with COVID restrictions, around 200 faithful are allowed inside the Church.\u00a0 The novena mass was also on livestream via the YouTube account of the parish.\u00a0 The Santo Ni\u00f1o has gone \u2018viral\u2019 in a way that the Cebuano devotee families have craved for His presence in this part of the diocese.\u00a0\u00a0 Fr. Joseph Abutu, the parish priest of St. Agatha, reflected in his homily during the Sinulog Fiesta mass on 17th of January 2021:<\/p>\n

\u201cThis image that was brought to the shores of Cebu 500 years ago was not just meant to be kept in the basilica or in our homes, but to be kept in our hearts; and irrespective of where we are and whatever the situation may be, the Word of God has taken on our flesh and He wants to dwell in us.\u00a0 The image of the Child Jesus reminds us of God\u2019s love and the presence of God in our midst.\u00a0 Above all, it reminds us of who we are: as baptised Christians, we are not just children of God and members of the Church.\u00a0 We are the image of God Himself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Looking back, the beginnings of this devotion in the parish started with another novena mass the Filipinos are very familiar with: the Simbang Gabi, a series of dawn masses in honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary.\u00a0 After each dawn mass, people would usually gather for breakfast at the church hall and fellowship happened.\u00a0 For the last three years, there is always a whisper hovering around this gathering about the Se\u00f1or Santo Ni\u00f1o.\u00a0 It seemed divine to think that the novena mass in honour of the Mother of God in December would blissfully flow into another novena mass in honour of the Son of God, the Holy Child Se\u00f1or Santo Ni\u00f1o.\u00a0 The December-January connection of the Hoy Family is tied together, to celebrate the season of Mary\u2019s Magnificat to the season of the revelation of the Son of God.\u00a0 It is always to Jesus through Mary, as most Catholics would attest.<\/p>\n

The Sinulog dance is one of the most fascinating parts of the celebration.\u00a0 It is pagan in origin because the Sugbuanons (Cebuanos) knew no other way to worship, but to dance.\u00a0 The dance-as-worship which is Sinulog, was a way of expressing thanksgiving to the Se\u00f1or for the many blessings He bestowed on the Cebuanos, particularly abundant rain when it was needed most by the farmers at that time.\u00a0 Later on it evolved to more than just the material thanksgiving: it truly became Catholic when the dance forms part of the liturgy as an offering.\u00a0 Pedro Chirino wrote in 1600s about the dance (as Mojares noted in his book):<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026they move their empty hands in harmony with feet, now slowly, now rapidly, now they move forward, now they step back; now they are on fire, now they are calm; now they come together, now they move apart. Everything is with graceful decency.\u201d<\/p>\n

The word Sinulog is currently interpreted to mean \u201cwave-like\u201d in reference to the back-and-forth movement of the dance, like a sulog, a native Cebuano word which means \u201cwater current.\u201d\u00a0 The St. Agatha Sinulog dancers epitomise this description, as so are dancers in other parishes.\u00a0 The Sinulog Committee itself is composed mostly of Cebuanos who were organised on a two-week notice after prayerful deliberations were made.\u00a0 Harold Mollaneda, the eventual committee head, recalled the whole experience as \u201cmiraculous, with basically no budget at the beginning, and then a $300 donation from a Filipino store.\u00a0 But we were able to feed 600 people during the Sinulog festivities itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is truly a blessing to have celebrated this Catholic tradition of the novena masses for the Santo Ni\u00f1o.\u00a0 Faith has gone a long way since 1521.\u00a0 The Basilica Minore del Santo Ni\u00f1o de Cebu has extended its periphery by way of the devotees. \u00a0\u00a0It is 2021 and we are celebrating it in another country we call home: our beloved Australia.\u00a0 Pope Francis\u2019s prophetic tone rings true when he admonished the Filipinos in his homily during the Simbang Gabi 2019 in Rome to \u201ccontinue to be smugglers of faith.\u201d<\/p>\n

To this we acclaim in chorus, much like the prayerful cry of the devotees: Viva Pit Se\u00f1or!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Deacon Neil Daculan 11 Jan. 2021 https:\/\/www.stagathas.org.au\/ The year 2021 is very significant for us Filipinos, especially among the Catholic Christians.\u00a0 It is our 500 years of Christianity in the Philippines, and Cebu stands as the seat of Christian faith of this southeast nation. It all started in 1521 with the baptism of Rajah…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":84,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4,3],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=64"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":272,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64\/revisions\/272"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/84"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=64"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=64"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinulog.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=64"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}