Fiesta: Spain’s Catholic legacy in the Philippines, and B.C.

Marissa Gomez resides in Delta, while family members still live in the Philippines. But something that keeps them connected is the annual fiesta they celebrate on the feast of the Transfiguration on Aug. 6.

“My family celebrates San Salvador (Holy Saviour), our town’s patron saint in Cavinti, Laguna, every August,” said Gomez, a parishioner at Immaculate Conception Parish.

She gladly describes the fiestas that are commonly celebrated on feast days in the Philippines as well as in Canada.

“Until now, we would celebrate his feast day here by having a picnic in the park on a Saturday, where we would eat sinukmani, which is sweet sticky rice.”

There are thousands of fiestas every year, and the smell of Filipino delicacies typically fills the air as an entire town prepares for a fiesta.

Each household in the neighbourhood boasts of its culinary specialties, and a recipe for embutido (Philippine meatloaf) or menudo (pork stew) will be different from one home to another.

Every town and city in the Philippines has a fiesta of its own as it is an excuse for locals to share their best food and their most potent potables with visitors from out of town.

The aromas create a symphony of flavours that makes the mouth water, as visitors obligingly hop from house to house to sample the delightful fare.

The fiesta is of Spanish origin and Spain brought it along with them on every colonizing trip they made, thus the abundance of fiestas in South America as well. The fiesta is celebrated as a thanksgiving for blessings bestowed upon the people, the livelihood and life of the town. In fact, the feast day of a saint is not only celebrated as an event, but the saint’s name is adopted as the name of the town itself: San Jose, San Pedro, San Pablo, Santa Maria, and San Andres are among the more popular ones.

When Spanish missionaries came to the Philippines in the 1500s, they discovered that the fiesta was a helpful tool to help teach Filipinos the Roman Catholic faith and its saints, as indigenous Filipinos already had a sense of patronage of a deity for their mostly pagan practices and rituals. The fiesta or feast commemorates a particular saint, and towns and cities in the Philippines have historically adopted one saint as their patron for one reason or another in place of the pagan gods they were used to honouring.

“We always celebrate the feast day of our patron saint St. James the Greater in Paete, Laguna, by praying a novena in his name,” said Edith Navoa of Precious Blood Parish in Surrey.

While not strictly a saint, the Santo Niño or Christ Child is an image found in every home in the Philippines, whether it is the patron of the town or not, and is celebrated by Filipinos everywhere. The Santo Niño is celebrated in many ways, but not as extensively as it is celebrated in Kalibo, Aklan, in the Visayan region.

There the Santo Niño is celebrated by the locals by wearing tribal clothing to imitate the aboriginal Ati tribe of the area who welcomed a group of Malay dates from neighbouring Borneo in the 13th century. Prior to the celebration of the Ati-Atihan as a fiesta honouring the Christ Child, the indigenous people worshipped an anito (a small dark-skinned idol) in their pagan rituals. When the Spaniards came to settle and to convert the people of the area, a representative made a deal with the Atis as well as the Malay people to dedicate future celebrations to the Santo Niño.

The Santo Niño is celebrated in other Visayan towns such as the Sinulog in Cebu which commemorates the icon of the Christ Child brought over by Ferdinand Magellan as a gift to Hara Amihan, wife of Cebu’s Rajah Humabon. The Santo Niño is celebrated as well as the Dinagyang in Iloilo. He is celebrated as a fiesta aside from the actual town fiesta named for a particular saint. That’s how popular Señor Santo Niño is with Filipinos.

The most celebrated of all saints is the Blessed Mother in many of her appearances in various towns, cities and provinces. She is called Nuestra Senora (Our Lady) because of the miracles she performed in a particular place. The Immaculate Conception is the favourite patroness of Filipinos, as it is this particular image that allowed Christ to be brought into the world.

Another saint who is as popular as Mary is her most chaste spouse, St. Joseph, who is a favourite in towns where woodworking is an industry. St. Isidore (San Isidro Labrador) is popular among agricultural towns where farmers and labourers honour him, while St. Peter and St. Andrew are favourites in towns where fishing is the means of livelihood.

St. Paul is popular among towns that are far to reach on foot, just like the saint’s journey, while St. John the Baptist is celebrated everywhere every year on June 24, his feast day, as Filipinos get a shower from well-wishers. Regardless of whether you are going to school or work, you will get doused in cold water in honour of the saint, so people are always ready with a set of change of clothes on this day!

St. Augustine is also a favourite among the saints in the Philippines, after the Blessed Mother and St. Joseph, as the Augustinians established some of the early missionary settlements on the island of Luzon. A few Pampanga towns namely Lubao, Mabalacat, Mexico, and Minalin, attribute their fiesta devotions to St. Augustine and his mother Sta. Monica, and the Augustinian Recollects.

“Our town, Porac, Pampanga celebrates our patron saint, Saint Catherine of Alexandria every November,” said Edna Dizon, from IC Delta. “We keep in touch with our kabalen (relatives) here on Nov. 25 so that we can pass on our tradition to the young ones who were born here in Canada.”

Dizon said the celebration consists of having a picnic and a party where they have a potluck spread consisting of caldereta (beef stew), pinakbet (sauteed vegetables) and lechon (roast pig) which is a staple in any Filipino feast.

Edith Navoa’s twin sister Julie Navoa of Immaculate Conception in Delta recalls, “When we were young, we would always help our mother prepare menudo (pork stew), dinuguan (blood stew) and suman (sticky rice) that we would share with our guests and neighbours.”

The sisters admit that the entire neighbourhood would be preparing the same things. “But of course, we think our mother’s version is the best in town!” said Edith.

While the highlight of the fiesta is the celebration of the life of the town, the more sombre part of the weekend is the religious practices that come with the feast day – the celebration of the Holy Mass, historical re-enactments, processions, novenas that happen weeks before the fiesta weekend, and singing of hymns.

The legacy of the Spanish settlers in the Philippines through the fiesta is not only an adoption of its Hispanic roots but has evolved into a truly Filipino way of life in the way the people honour God and his saints who are in heaven.

Rosette Correa is a member of the archdiocese’s Filipino Ministry and a teacher at Immaculate Conception school.

To mark the 500th anniversary of Christianity in the Philippines, The B.C. Catholic is partnering with the Archdiocese of Vancouver’s Filipino Ministry to tell stories and personal reflections on Filipino Catholic life and service throughout the year.

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