Devotees tell tales of Navotas Nazarene's 'walkabouts'

MANILA, Philippines - Devotees who flocked to a chapel in Bangkulasi, Navotas City to pay their respects to a 400-year-old statue of the sleeping Nazarene on Good Friday have their own stories of how the image “wakes up” and walks out of the chapel to help people in need.

The image, which is five feet long, is made of dark hardwood and dressed in gold and maroon. On Friday, thousands of devotees lined up to visit the image. The devotees included penitents who flogged themselves to seek favor from their “Mahal na Senyor (Beloved Señor).”

One of the statue’s caretakers, Willie Gatbon, said the line of devotees reaches as long as 10 kilometers. He said the devotees from various parts of the country: some bring along their sick relatives, asking for healing, while others ask for success in business and other favors.

He said tales of the image waking up and walking to various places have been passed from one generation to another.

Gatbonton said one of the more popular tales is that the Nazarene, in the form of an old man, visited a trader in Batangas and bought a “banig” or sleeping mat. He gave the trader a Navotas address where he could get the payment for the mat.

When the trader went to the address, it turned out to be the Bangkulasi chapel, and he found the statue “sleeping” on the mat.

Gatbonton said the Nazarene also reportedly helped guerillas during World War 2. One of the devotees who visited the statue is a law student who claimed he passed the latest Bar exam by praying to the image.

Whispers, baths

Gatbonton said the statue was brought by the Spaniards when they arrived in the country and it was handed down from one generation to another.

He said the statue, which is articulated, used to be nailed to a cross on Good Friday, but since the statue is already “weak,” it will remain in the sleeping position.

“I whisper to the Holy Nazarene every time we open the glass casing” to display the image on Good Friday, Gatbonton said.

He said the statue “usually” takes a bath at a well beside the chapel and sometimes goes out to neighboring areas disguised as a beggar. Gatbonton said the wet footsteps of the statue are visible each time he leaves the glass casing.

Some devotees said an old man – who resembled the statue – asked for water but was denied by a resident of a posh subdivision in Marikina City, just before tropical storm “Ondoy” devastated Metro Manila last year.

“You have no water, I’ll give you plenty of water,” the old man reportedly said. Moments later, the rain started and floods submerged the city, according to the devotees’ story.

Some devotees said other accounts have an old woman or a woman with a baby asking for water in other areas of Metro Manila.