This week is Holy Week

Holy week began last Sunday and will end with Sabado de Gloria, which as we mentioned in an earlier column was the day when President Macapagal- Arroyo was born and gave her the name Gloria. The next day is Easter, the solemnity of the resurrection of Jesus Christ celebrated after the first Sunday after the vernal equinox.

We have never understood why Christmas, the day that marks the Nativity of our Lord, is commemorated on a fixed date — December 25. Why is the death and resurrection of Christ a movable feast? To complicate matters, a few years ago, the Church also converted the Epiphany that was always celebrated on January 6 to a movable feast commemorated on the first Sunday of January that does not fall on a New Year. In short, the birth of Christ is celebrated on a fixed day and the manifestation of Christ to the Three Kings is now also a movable feast. What is the point? During Spanish times, the Filipinos exchanged Christmas gifts not during Christmas day but on the feast of the Three Kings. It was only after the coming of the Americans that gifts were exchanged on Christmas and Santa Claus replaced the Nativity as the focal point of Christmas.

When the first Sunday of January falls on New Year’s Day, the feast of the Three Kings is now celebrated on the second Sunday of January which falls on January 8. This means that the Christmas season is being extended by two days. So the old song about the 12 days of Christmas is now obsolete. We assume that this was done to reduce the number of holydays. But its effect is that we have abolished an ancient traditional holyday that we always knew as the Feast of the Three Kings. Today only the Casino Español retains the tradition. They observe it as they always celebrated it in the past with the three men riding on horseback distributing gifts to the street children.

But going back to Holy Week, we are pleased to note that some of the old customs have survived to our times. First and foremost are the practices of visita iglesia and the washing of the feet. Many, many people still visit as many churches as they can during Holy Week. And the liturgical washing of the feet which commemorates an action of Christ performed during the Last Supper when he washed the feet of his disciples to teach them humility as a condition for the practice of charity. Today an integral part of the liturgy of Holy Thursday, following the Homily of the Mass, the Pope washes the feet of a number of poor men in St. Peter's. Here the priests wash the feet of the poor in their respective churches as part of the Holy Thursday celebration.

As usual, Holy Week here will be marked by an exodus of people leaving the cities where they work to be with their families in their provinces. May the Holy Week bring us all closer to our Creator.