Sto. Niño comes home to Iloilo
Iloilo City - San Jose Placer Parish Priest Fr. Roy Margallo, OSA, said that the Holy Image of Senor Santo Nino de Cebu will arrive in Iloilo on January 20, 2006, for the Dinagyang Festival.
Fr. Margallo said that the arrival will be a reenactment of the first coming of the Holy Image aimed at strengthening the devotion to the Sto. Nino which is the root of the Dinagyang.
He will bring the Holy Image from Cebu on January 20, arriving at the Iloilo airport about 1:00 p.m. where a brief reenactment program will be held.
As customary in areas where missionaries first brought the Holy Image of the Sto. Nino, the friar first talked with the leader of the community. In the reenactment, Fr. Margallo will be met by Iloilo City Mayor Jerry Trenas, with whom he will exchange pleasantries. He will then give a brief speech as he gives the image to Mayor Trenas.
Mayor Trenas will in turn give his speech of acceptance, followed by the releasing of red and gold balloons, the lighting of firecrackers and the performance of tribes at the tarmac, as a sign of welcoming the Holy Image from Cebu. In the traditional custom, native tribes in the communities where the Sto. Nino was first brought, also performed dances and rituals as their way of accepting the image.
The leader of the tribe will then place the Sto. Nino image in an altar for the people to pay homage to. In this reenactment, Mayor Trenas will place the Holy Image in an altar prepared at the airport, where devotees and tourists alike will be given time to pay homage to it.
The reenactment at the airport will be followed by a motorcade, where Mayor Trenas and fr. Margallo will carry the image in an open vehicle down the main thoroughfares in Jaro and downtown Iloilo.
From the Iloilo Airport, the motorcade will proceed to Jaro, making a stop-o ver at the Cathedral, where the miraculous Nuestra Senora de la Candelaria, "bearer of Light", the Mother of Jesus is. Here, the entourage will stop at the gate for a short prayer.
Fr. Margallo said that the stop-over at the Jaro Cathedral is meaningful in a sense that Jesus must pay respect to His Mother.
The motorcade will then proceed to the San Jose Parish, passing the main streets of Iloilo City amidst lighted firecrackers and showers of confetti and petals of flowers. The establishments and offices along the route are
asked to display an image of Sr. Sto. Nino in an altar in their facade.
Upon reaching the San Jose Church, the entourage will participate in a Holy Mass that signals the opening of the Dinagyang 2006 festivities. After the Mass, Mayor Trenas and Fr. Roy Margallo will bring the Holy Image to the Iloilo Freedom Grandstand for the formal opening rites of Dinagyang 2006.
Fr. Margallo said that the reenactment is not just a ceremony or a ritual, but a significant event that shows the deeper meaning of the coming of the Sto. Nino to Iloilo - that is - "to complete the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph".
He added that "San Jose", the Patron Saint of the parish, is not the worker or the carpenter, as many devotees are likely to attribute, but Mary's husband. So the Sto. Nino "comes home" to His Mother and Father. (ESSubong/PIA 6)