Preserving the Santacruzan tradition as a prayer for peace and unity

My late husband Max was often interviewed by foreign correspondents regarding situations in the Philippines. One question frequently asked by these journalists was, “How can one describe the Philippines?” Max’s direct reply to an Australian journalist was “the Philippine culture is simply 300 years in a Spanish convent and 70 years in Hollywood.”

Sharing, growing and developing our faith within the community

When Spain sailed into our islands in 1521, the Christianization of our islands followed suit; and for the next 300 years till today the ritualizing of our faith has been the best means of sharing, growing and developing our religious beliefs within the family and the community.

Dating back to Spanish times, a religious procession usually concludes the summer fiesta celebrated by a town or city in honor of their patron saint. On May 14 and 15 will be the fiestas of Pulilan, Bulacan (the Kneeling Carabao Festival) and Lucban, Quezon (Pahiyas Festival) to honor the patron saint of farmers, San Isidro Labrador. Then there is the Flores de Mayo, wherein the homage to the Blessed Mother with flower and prayer offerings is made in church during the days, and is culminated at the end of May with a grand evening procession known as the Santacruzan. The latter involves nine celebrations with novena prayers, whereby the parish hermanas and the barangay captain agree who will be the first eight hosts and the hermano mayor for the finale night in the barrio.

Sorting out the confusion

From my childhood in the ’50s, I always looked forward to being invited to be part of this celebration. As mestiza preschoolers, my cousin, sister and I were given “the honor” of holding the cape of Reyna Elena, the major personality of the procession along with her son, Prinsipe Constantino. Auntie Plicia always managed to borrow pretty lace gowns for this occasion and later make us pose formally for studio portraits. However, as I grew older and became a sagala (usually as one of the Ave Marias or the banderada), I observed the confusion of activities. Although the statue of the Blessed Mother is revered, the rosary prayers are seldom recited. More and more the interest concentrated on the “beauty pageant” – the Hollywood influence diluting the Spanish convent influence. It is lamentable that as a Filipino nation, we have allowed ourselves to get lost in this confusion.

In the early ‘90s my daughter was invited to be Reyna Elena in Mandaluyong. To her surprise when she got to the venue – all dressed in her gown and crown as the lead personage of the traditional procession – there were 20 other Reyna Elenas. Manila Hotel’s crowd-drawing annual Santacruzan has devolved from a ritual with a spiritual message into a beauty parade and fashion show, featuring young beauties, models, actresses and actors whose outfits (gowns and barongs) are designed by well-known Filipino designers.

I concede that physical beauty can be a compliment to the prayer and flower offerings of the Santacruzan; but as to expensive costumes and gowns … Roxanne, one of our poetic neighbors, pointed out that to simply dress in white would be the best attire since Our Holy Mother prefers simplicity as an expression of purity of heart.

The Holy Cross, the sign of man’s salvation

The Santacruzan (santa = holy/cruz = cross) is a religious tradition commemorating the search of St. Helena for the real cross on which our Lord was crucified to redeem mankind from sin and open the way for our inner transformation.

The Cross reminds the people of the central role of the Crucifixion in our Christian faith, and the pivotal role it played in the conversion of a once-pagan Rome that crucified our Savior and later persecuted the early Christians. It is said that Constantine, the princely son of the powerful Queen Helena, was reminded frequently as a child by his mother, “I’d rather see you dead than you commit a mortal sin!”

History shares that the Sign of the Cross appeared to him and his soldiers in the sky during one of his battles for claiming the throne to unite numerous feudal lands of Italy. A voice told him, “By this Cross you shall conquer!” Thus he became the first Christian king of the new Holy Roman Empire. Christianity became the official religion of the state. The search for the Holy Cross in the Holy Land became the lifetime quest of the Queen Mother. This triggered two centuries of the so-called Holy Crusades among European princes in the Middle East. It is thought that St. Francis played a major part in converting a Moorish sultan who convinced his uncle to part with the true Holy Cross of our Savior that it may be given back to the Christians.

Mary’s love garden

Since 1995, we have devoted the whole month of May to the Blessed Mother. The wooden stage of the school lobby along Eisenhower front gate is decorated into a love garden of flowers. From morning until evening, people would pause and enjoy the beautiful wooden, lifelike smiling statues of Our Lady of Liberty and Hope together with her Son, Our Lord of Wisdom and Compassion, who descends from a heavenly staircase to bless everyone. Our Lady is wearing a golden cape (not a crown) and holds in one hand a lotus to symbolize ecumenism. Sharing in this garden of flowers is the statue of four-year-old Niño Bonito and the blue and gold cross. Three sets of fresh flower baskets, seven in each group, surround the holy images.

The Banderadas, Faith, Hope and Charity (Group I)

The personages and symbols of the Santacruzan is a mixed representation of the Old Testament, the New Testament and the Litany of Our Blessed Mother. The most powerful prayers in the world to our Lord are through the intercession of the Blessed Mother whose many titles include “Co-Redemptrix.” Thus, the whole procession symbolizes the rosary as the intercessory prayer of the Blessed Mother to help solve the problem of peace and unity.

The procession starts with the Cross, held high by the acolytes who accompany the parish priest. The banderadas or flag bearing ladies follow, carrying the Philippine flag and the banner of the village or institution. To represent the flower offering to Our Blessed Lady, a group of very young Flores girls and boys follows, holding eight scrolls of the prayer, Hail Mary. This has been my personal innovation to focus on the value of the Rosary. Eight young ladies hold the letter A-V-E M-A-R-I-A. Three ladies follow next, representing Faith (the Cross), Hope (the anchor) and Charity (the Heart), the basic spiritual sentiments of man.

Tower of David, Arc of the Covenant, etc. (Group II)

Four more titles suggesting the intercessory power of Mother Mary between mankind and God are shown by the Arc of the Covenant, the House of Gold, the Tower of Ivory and the Gate of Heaven. In the year 2000 I added to these six more “holy gifts” to mankind as sculpted mystically around the pedestal of the Lord of Sixteen Summers riding the white horse in the Shrine Avenue fronting the school. He is also known as the Lord of Love and the lieutenant of God the Father, Creator of the Earth.

These “holy gifts” are symbolized by the Wheel of Justice, the Divine Call, a gold bell representing the gold house of Spiritual Learning, the Spiritual Well of Knowledge, the Tree of Life, Mother Earth, a gold eagle representing the Guardian of the Nation, and the Gold Sun Disc symbolizing God’s energy bursting out of the sun.

Las Reynas (Group III)

The Divina Pastora, representing our Blessed Mother as the Shepherdess of the Faithful, who wears a flower hat and carries a lamb and a staff, heads the next group. An angel with a lamb accompanies her together with four pairs of child shepherds. St. Veronica, the holy lady who wiped the bloody face of Jesus on the Way of the Cross, Reyna Justicia, the blindfolded Queen of Justice holding a balancing scale, Reyna Judith and Reyna Ester, two brave queens of Israel, one of whom cut off the enemy’s head that of the Assyrian general, Holofernes. The Queen of Peace is dressed in white and gold holding a white dove followed by four pairs of children holding cages of doves.

The next group shows other queenly titles of the Blessed Mother the Mystical Rose, the Reyna de las Estrellas (Queen of Stars), Reyna de las Flores (Queen of Flowers), Reyna de los Angeles (Queen of Angels) and Reyna Emperatriz (Empress wife of Emperor Constantine). The final and most honored position is the Reyna Elena and the young Principe Constantino.

On May 7, 2016, the O.B. Montessori Santacruzan will parade around the Shrine Avenue embracing Eisenhower and Annapolis streets and the Greenhills Shopping complex to especially pray for the elusive world peace and unity. It is not just a parade of beauties but it will also feature a float with the miraculous Lord of Wisdom and Compassion and Our Lady of Hope and Liberty, carved during the uncertain and unsettled months preceding the Gulf War of 1990 through Punay and psychic sculptor Pempe Floriano. Also in the float will be the very lifelike wooden statue of the blonde, blue-eyed four-year-old Sto. Niño wearing the O.B. Montessori preschool uniform. A smaller float will hold the giant replica of Angelique Victoria who is a symbol of the OBMC’s “pains and gains” over 50 years.

It has been noted that during the yearly celebration of the grand spiritual Santacruzan, blessings have manifested. They are showered upon the participants, the crowd, and even the passersby, who come and revere the statues in the observance of this spiritual celebration. Significantly, not only the people from Metro Manila benefit from these blessings but the whole nation as well.

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