2016 Marian festival in Tochigi, Japan
Every year, the Diocese of Saitama in Japan celebrates the Marian Festival in October. The Diocese of Saitama covers prefectures in Japan and each area with many member churches and parishioners. These areas, with some of the churches include: Tochigi (Imaichi, Nikko, Kanuma, Matsugamine and Mine Churches in Utsunomiya, Kami no Kawa, Tochigi, Sano, Ashikaga, Otawara, Nasu, Karasuyama, and Oyama), Saitama (Urawa, Kumagaya, Tokorozawa, higashi-matsuyama, Kawagoe, Kita-urawa, Fukaya, Honjo, Ibaraki (Mito, Toride, Tsukuba, Joso, Tsuchiura, Koga, Shimodate, Kashima, Tomobe, Naka, Hitachi), and, Gumma (Maebashi and more).
This time around, the churches of Tochigi served as coordinator for the festival. Like previous years, the festival was well-attended. Most of the estimated 500 participants last Sunday, October 23, were Filipinos with their families. There were also foreigners from Latin America, Africa, Japan, among others.
The highlight of the Festival is the Rosary for Mama Mary. For this 7th Marian Festival, the Tochigi participants formed a human rosary, with each member carrying an electric candle, which were later on given a rose each to offer to Mama Mary. Adults, elderly, and the young participated and gamely stood the whole time while the Rosary was being recited. The rest of the participants were comfortably seated inside the huge hall prepared by the festival coordinators.
The Rosary was followed by a mass concelebrated by Fr.Nelson Cabasisi and Fr. Jack Serate, the director of the Open House and also the head of the Filipino Pastoral Team of the Diocese of Saitama. The Oyama choir provided the beautiful music joined in actively by the rest of Saitama Diocese participants.
An hour lunch break followed. Guests could choose from among several food booths that served Filipino dishes like dinuguan, pancit palabok, pancit guisado, menudo and more. Fresh saba and canned coconut juice were also up for sale. Other participants from other churches decided to bring baon, sharing their homemade, delicious food, dessert, and drinks with everyone else. It was a happy occasion to see the guests, especially the more numerous Filipinos from various parishes interacting and bonding happily with one another!
We would like to especially thank our Toride kababayans who always prepare so much delicious food in almost all of our diocesan activities! They are always the biggest delegation as well! Padayon your happy, united service for the Lord, Toride ladies!
A well-prepared line up of performances followed the happy lunch. It was nostalgic seeing the various Filipino dances rendered beautifully by the participants from the various churches who took time to practice and prepare beautiful costumes and props for the occasion. Children also joined in by rendering song numbers and joining in the dances. Choral groups also prepared beautiful, inspiring music for Mama Mary and the audience.
Dave Aguilar brought the house down with his unique rendition of "Our Father" and "I Believe" combined. He became an instant idol among the ladies in the audience who competing with each other for a selfie with him while he was doing his requested encore number, "Ngayon at Kailanman." Our kababayans back in the Philippines will have a chance to hear Dave when he will guest in some morning shows there and when he will compete there (as the Filipino winner in Japan) sometime soon.
With more than 200,000 Filipinos now in Japan, meeting them for rare occasions like this year's Marian Festival allows us to unite as one people, coming together to celebrate a fiesta. Praying, eating, and enjoying together are worth traveling hours for each year to honor Mama Mary.
The Festival is also an occasion to raise funds especially to assist needy returnee Filipino migrants from Japan. Happy na, busog pa, which includes our hearts and spirit!
Thank you to all Tochigi parishioners who wonderfully coordinated this year's festival! Congratulations and salamat to Fr. Jack, Neddie Codog, Hunny Ezure and all others from Tochigi parishes who made this year's Marian Festival a very happy, sacred occasion for all, especially for our Pinoys throughout the Saitama Diocese!
Until next year, we look forward to the 8th Marian Festival to be coordinated and hosted by the Saitama parishes!
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