Christmas at Caraga, 1884

A week before Christmas, a daily Mass in honor of the Virgin Mother was held in the parish of Caraga but with a moderate number of people in attendance. On the last day of the vigil of Christmas, a simple Belen was set up outside the convent where the images of the Child Jesus, Mary, and Joseph were displayed.

According to the account of Fr. Pedro Rosell, a Jesuit, and Fr. Pablo Pastells, SJ, the parish priest, spent the Advent season and Christmas proper in town. In his letter to the Mission Superior dated April 17, 1885, datelined Caraga, he wrote:

‘Christmas eve came, and at eleven o’clock the bells rung loudly, and from half past eleven until twelve, a continual ringing of bells two at a time announced to the people that mass was called [Misa de] 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 will to be born on that poor and abandoned manger threshold [portal de Belen].’

When midnight struck, the missa cantata, also called the media, was said, followed by the adoration of the holy Child, which made pleasant by the singing of Christmas carols. At dawn on December 25, the day was met joyfully and bright. Fr. Rosell continued:

‘At eight o’clock in the morning, solemn mass (i.e., Missa solemnis) was celebrated according to custom of the choir of singers of the church, with the accompaniment of the two flutes and a tambourine. About one hundred persons took communion at it. There was a sermon, and at the end of the mass, there was another adoration of the Child Jesus.’

After the ceremonies, the village chiefs visited the priests and pledged to participate in all the feats all year round. Following this, the musicians and the singers applauded the clerics at the presbytery hall for the Christmas celebration and rendered toccatas and carols. Thereafter, the churchgoers, with distinction, also greeted the priests.

‘What attracted my attention most,’ Fr. Rosell reminisced, ‘was the liberty with which they went up and down stairs, hither and thither, and addressed the fathers and begged for what they needed. I will say it: the convent appeared nothing more than nor less than a Casa Pairal. Since the ceremonies of the morning were so long, nothing was done in the afternoon except to have the adoration of the holy Child, a thing which those excellent and simple people enjoy greatly and never tire of doing. With that the feast of the nativity of our Lord ended.’

What was lacking during the Christmas celebration, Fr. Rosell added, was the nougat, ‘a family of confections made with sugar or honey, roasted nuts (almonds, walnuts, pistachios, hazelnuts, and macadamia nuts are common), whipped egg whites, and sometimes chopped candied fruit’ that failed to arrive in time from Surigao for the year-end festivities. For the first time, he observed how the people of Caraga greeted the coming of feast of the Nativity, impressed no less by the naïveté they exhibited:

‘I noted no rich jewels and refined music in the church. All was simplicity and poverty, like a new parish recently separated from its metropolitan, and given over to its own life with few resources, in a most wretched country. Neither did I observe in the village anything at that excessive luxury, and the annoying diversions with which in other parts, the Christians of divided heart try falsely to honor God. Caraga, in spite of its antiquity of two centuries, with its excellent lands, and its established reputation of producing excellent cacao, coffee, and tobacco, is a small, poor, and simple village… [I]t has been deserted by several old families who have settled in the small villages recently established, and although it has increased somewhat with the new Christians… the latter are as a rule, both simple and indolent and but little accustomed to work, and they need rather to be aided, instead of being able to give aid to the others.’ (7) (By Antonio V. Figueroa)