Sinulog Festival 2012 Photos (107) (Photo credit: Constantine Agustin)While watching at the cultural dance presentation depicting the historical introduction of the child Jesus to the pagan royal family in Cebu, I could hardly control my tears while feeling so happy and thankful about our ancestors who first embraced Christianity with great joy. They started our faith in a great God named Jesus.
Sto. Niño is the Spanish for "Holy Child" who is Jesus himself. The image is simply a reminder of the all those who believe in Jesus that he too became a child. The image per se is not our God but we simply pay respect to the image of the child who became a matured man and dwelt among us and later on died for our sins. What's is good about the Christian Catholic faith is that it is so profound that it allows our believers to pay respect to images but still believe in an unseen Being.
The Santo Niño de Cebú ("Holy Child of Cebu") is a celebrated Roman Catholic statue of the Child Jesus venerated by Filipino Roman Catholics. Claiming to be the oldest religious image in the Philippines, the statue was originally donated by Ferdinand Magellan to Rajah Humabon and his wife Humamay in 1521, along with a statue of the Our Lady of Guidance and Ecce Homo. Believed to be originally made in Belgium, it is highly similar to the Infant Jesus of Prague.
The statue is clothed in expensive textile robes and a gold crown, mostly donated from fervent devotees in the Philippines and abroad. The statue gained prominence when it miraculously survived a great parish fire in 1565. The statue is permanently housed under bulletproof glass at the Basilica Minore del Santo Niño in Cebu City. Its feast is celebrated every third Sunday of January. It is one of the most recognizable cultural images in the Philippines found in many secular and religious areas.
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