17/12/2021
SOMBER CHRISTMAS CELEBRATION DURING THE SPANISH TIMES
"Somber" may define our Christmas mood this year. It looks like the cheerful atmosphere of December has been extinguished by face masks and physical distancing.
The Corona Vi scare redefined our ways of celebrating Christmas this year from shopping for gifts to attending the Simbang Gabi (anticipated masses, early evening, 15-23 December), the dawn masses (early morning, 16-24 December) and Christmas eve (early evening, 24 December,before curfew time set by LGUs). Hearty family reunions may be regulated or virtual. No fun for the 'namamasko po' kids on Christmas Day because of health protocols.
It seems that there was not much Christmas fun also during the Spanish regime. There were no Christmas shopping and Christmas parties in our lifestyle during those 300plus years. Santa Claus, Christmas trees and other trimmings arrived with the Americans, and became part of the Pinoy cultural fabric in the 20th century.
During the Spanish era, the mood of the season focused on the spiritual starting from the feast of the Inmaculada Concepcion de la Virgen Maria, patroness of the country and of the Manila Cathedral, on the 8th of December until the feast of the Epiphany on the 6th of January.
For example, at the Manila Cathedral in 1859, they held 40 hours of jubilee for the Immaculate Conception. The ordinates had specific assignments during the religious services from the 8th to the 10th of December. Ordinates Don Jacinto Zamora and Don Jose Burgos were assigned to keep watch before the Blessed Sacrament in the morning, Zamora on 09 December, and Burgos on the 10th. In their watch the next year, Zamora had his shift in the early evening of the 8th and Burgos in the early morning.
The priests Burgos and Zamora suffered martyrdom in 1872.
The religious mood can also be gleaned from the whole-page spread titled "Alegoria de la noche buena" [posted picture] in the 25 December 1875 issue of the El Oriente, an illustrated weekly on the sciences, literature, arts, etcetera. The upper part depicted the events of Christmas: the trip to Jerusalem, the nativity, the epiphany and escape to Egypt. The lower portion depicted two men tending to a flock of turkeys, people going to church, and a group gathered around a dining table probably enjoying their noche buena.
An inside section on cultos religiosos (religious services) informed readers of the daily schedules of these services in the various churches inside the walled city from the 19th to the the 25th, Christmas day. The daily Misa de Aguinaldo would continue to be celebrated in the Intramuros and Santo Domingo churches starting at 4:30 and 5:00 o'clock in the morning, respectively.
On the 24th, there would be a vigil of the nativity, and Christians were asked to do FASTING AND ABSTINENCE on that day.
Christmas day would begin with a sung mass in almost all the churches at midnight in celebration of the ineffable mystery of the birth of Jesus, sung with all solemnity before the matins.
There was a time in our religious history, in the 1680s, when Archbishop Philip Pardo prohibited the celebration of the Misa de Aguinaldo because the masses were contaminated "with practices that were superstitious, and contrary to the holy rites of the church" (Sanchez et al, 1683-89).
But around a century later, Fray Pedro Murillo Velarde (1749) was already writing about the nine-day early morning masses being sung with great solemnity.
In 1885, Fray Pedro Rosell was describing to his superior the religious ceremonies being held "to honor the birth of our Blessing, Jesus." He wrote of the celebration of the Immaculate Conception "a week beforehand" followed by "a daily mass of the [Virgin Mary]." We read this as the nine-day dawn Misas de Aguinaldo.
"On the last day or the vigil of the feast," Rosell continued, "a pleasing, although simple Belen was made at one side of the presbytery in which were placed the images of the Child, Mary, and Joseph. Christmas eve came, and at eleven o'clock the bells were rung loudly, and from half past eleven until twelve, a continual ringing of bells two at a time announced to the people that the mass called Gallo was to be celebrated in memory of that holy hour in which the eternal Son of God the Father, made man in the most pure entrails of the Virgin Mary willed to be born on that poor and abandoned manger threshold [portal de Belen]. Hence when twelve o'clock had struck, the missa-cantata was said, which was followed by the adoration of the holy Child. That was made enjoyable by the singing of some fine Christmas carols. The twenty-fifth dawned bright and joyful."
BACK TO THE PRESENT. Have you reserved your seat at the Simbang Gabi or dawn masses? In many churches, registration was required, a seat number given, and QR codes issued for easier entry to the church.
Whether our family reunions will be virtual, and probably noche buenas shared globally with relatives and friends via Zoom or FB video chats, MALIGAYANG PASKO, MERRY CHRISTMAS, EVERYONE!
-- Liberato F. Ramos
POSTSCRIPT. This post is culled from my Naquem blog on 17 December 2013.
References:
1. I.E.14 Libro de Gobierno Ecclesiastical. Folders 1 & 2. Archdiocesan Archives of Manila.
2. SDS-23337 El Oriente 1875-76. National Archives of the Philippines.
3. Sanchez, Juan, et al. (1683-89). Felipe Pardo as archbishop. The Pardo Controversy. In Blair & Robertson, The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898. Rizal: Cachos Hermanos, 1973.
4. Velarde, P. M. (1749). Jesuit missions in the seventeenth century. In Blair & Robertson, Idem.
5. Rosell, P. (1885, Apr 17). Letter from Father Pedro Rosell [S.J.]. In Blair & Robertson, Idem.
