P2.5M for “prestigious’ Sinulog stage backdrop

CEBU, Philippines - Cebu City will be spending around P2.5 million for the much-awaited backdrop of the main stage for this year’s Sinulog at the Cebu City Sports Center.

Sinulog Foundation Executive Director Ricky Ballesteros said the backdrop will depict the 450th year of ‘Kaplag’ or the discovery of the historical and miraculous image of the Santo Niño.

The stage will bear a “prestigious” backdrop of the Basilica Minore del Santo Niño highlighting the altar of the Holy Child.

Ballesteros said spectators have a lot to look forward to in this year’s Grand Finale at the sports center. He said the finale will feature a “travelogue” of the presence of Augustinian fathers in the country even before the Spanish era, as well as the history of the Santo Niño.

This will be presented through highly classical drama and musical play that will be performed by thousand of dancers, singers and artists from different colleges and universities in Cebu.

 He said the performance will partly evolve on the discovery of the Holy Child during the Spanish expedition in 1565 led by Miguel Lopez de Legazpi who was tasked by the Order of St. Augustine missionaries who accompanied the voyage to celebrate the unearthing of the image.

 Ballesteros said organizers went through very “rigorous and meticulous” research since August last year to come up with the backdrop and the whole historical-classical performance.

 “It entails a lot of work from research to conceptualization to actual design. This would be a very good performance for the students and our balikbayans kun unsa ka importante ang Cebu sa whole Asia for kristiyanismo,” he said. 

 In his article in The Freeman dated December 21, 2014, Fr. Eusebio Bangcaya Berdon, OSA, defines Kaplag as “evangelization” – the coordinated and integrated efforts of both the evangelizers and the evangelized to know and live the teachings of Christ, to become his disciples, and to become members of his Church.

 “Kaplag is not only a one-time event, the finding of the image; it also  denotes the discovering further who this Holy Child is, and extendedly the knowing further of the Church that presents the Santo Niño image as representing the Son of God,” Berdon wrote.  (FREEMAN)