2011 Sinulog: Continuities and changes

Expectedly, the novenas will have started and will soon end. The thousands, if not millions, will be present for the sacred procession and the festive presentation. Cebu will remain in fiesta mode, extending from Christmas till the celebration for the Sto. Niño will be over.

There will be the grand family and clan reunions, the sumptuous meals, the unending updating and jokes. On a personal note, we are sure Tia Rosy will once again have family and friends over tonight while Alice and her family will warmly welcome all who will want to watch the Sinulog presentation from their strategically located building!

Local and foreign tourists will continue to pour in to watch the grand Sinulog. Stores and malls will vibrate with energy, as will other businesses out in the streets where the crowds will be. Year in, year out, there are continuities and there are changes that can be observed during this period where the sacred and the secular related to the Sinulog merge.

On the dimension of the sacred, the devotion and prayers will always be there. The prayerful people will also be present. The laity and the clergy will join together in worship and thanksgiving for yet another year of blessings, past, present and future, from the Child Jesus. And of course, God, to whom all the prayers and devotions are raised, God always remains the same. God never changes. God is always with all.

And for as long as there are those who believe in God and in His only Son Jesus Christ, the Child God, the Sto. Niño, then the feast will always be celebrated and remembered by those who believe, by those who have faith.

The style of celebration may remain or change. For now, the Feast of the Sto. Niño is met with dances and creative presentations by groups not only from within but from outside of Cebu as well. Whether the Sinulog “mardi gras” will remain or not will be subject to human decision later.

For this year’s Sinulog, Cebu’s beloved Ricardo Cardinal Vidal will be bidding goodbye to give way to Archbishop Jose Palma. Whether changes in the religious manner of celebrating the Feast of the Sto. Niño will be initiated under the new church leadership will be known in time.

What will remain and persist for as long as the feast will continue will be the multitude attracted to worship and to celebrate. Businesses also follow the multitude. Sadly, traffic and garbage as well as security problems also emerge and continue to accompany every Sinulog celebration.

One can already see a consistent post-sinulog news item: How much garbage the worshipping, the celebratory multitude had left behind.

The crowds come with their faith, they come with their energy for feasting, they leave with their faith and hearts filled with joy and stomachs fully satistied. Why they have to leave behind so much trash and garbage, why the same worshipping crowd does not remember to responsibly manage their own trash speaks so much of the gap between the sacred and the secular. If the world were God’s and the crowd comes yearly to honor, to thank and to worship God who made this world, why cannot the same crowd see the connection between their trash and their worship?

Preserving, protecting God’s created world, in the case of the Sinulog, sparing the city so much waste that comes from each one’s hands, can be part of their worship for the unchanging God, for His loving Son.

Perhaps Archbishop Palma, as part of his leadership, can include this from this year’s Sinulog onwards, the reminder to all to responsibly manage waste, inside and outside of God’s church? Can this year’s Sinulog be a good time to change this continuing unacceptable waste mismanagement?

Pit Senyor to you all!

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