Lenten recollections of long ago

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Story and photos by Vic Salas

Good Friday procession in Molo district is one of the grandest processions in the city, with elaborately designed caros (or carrozas) with thousands joining. It’s something I recall from childhood some 60 years past, and made me think about the traditional ways that Lent was observed.

Lent begins with Ash Wednesday, which is also a day of fasting and abstinence. People are marked with a cross on their forehead, using ashes, as a reminder that “from dust you come, to dust you will return.” From then on, till about six weeks after, every Friday would mean fasting (two small meals, one big meal — with no meat). Now, it seems fewer follow the fasting-and-abstinence traditions; it is not uncommon to see dozens of people feasting at the local Jollibee, foreheads marked.

The more somber traditions would begin during Holy Week — presaged by the Palm Sunday procession. We’d rush off to the church, hoisting lukay (young palm fronds) shaped like crosses (and other more elaborate handmade creations) to have them blessed, waving them to catch the drops of holy water. These would be hung around the house, displayed in family altars, or tucked into the sawali walls between the bamboo slats, to keep evil spirits away. These would gradually turn brown and dry, but remain there until the next Palm Sunday, when they would be replaced by a new batch of palmeras. But even with the joy of Palm Sunday hosannas, there would be an underlying current of sadness for the events of the coming week, leading to the Passion.

From Holy Monday till the dawn of Easter Sunday, there would be a gradual decrescendo of our usual activities both at home and at school. Maundy Thursday and Good Friday would be official holidays; often the afternoon of Holy Wednesday is declared a holiday, so people could travel back to their hometowns to observe Holy Week and do their penitential tasks to atone for the transgressions of the past year. However, when I was working in Manila in the ’80s, and sometime in the mid-’90s, we’d also take off for beach destinations like Puerto Galera, and later, it would be Boracay, presumably to cool off and do one’s Lenten recollections there, without the chafing restrictions at home. The Holy Week shenanigans there were legendary, and facetiously referred to as acceptable, since “Jesus was dying and would not be able to see acts of mischief!”

Life would really slow down during Holy Week in Iloilo – radio stations would play slower music, interrupt their broadcasts with biblical readings, and air religious dramas. Everyone would be tuned in to catch the Seven Last Words, which would take more than a couple of hours, with imagined dialogues of the time, all based on the Scriptures and the Bible. The movie houses would re-show biblical dramas like “The Robe,” “Quo Vadis,” “Ben-Hur,” and “The Ten Commandments.” Charlton Heston’s face would be prominent in movie posters. I can still recall the ending of “The Robe” where Jean Simmons walks placidly with a beatific smile, as heavenly choirs sing, and the background gradually transforms into the clouds and skies — a dramatic presentation of Ascension, and that scene would fill me with emotions of all kinds. At home we would be forbidden to run around and play vigorously. Lola would go, “Ssh! … Mag pamalandong kamo … Si Kristo naga agunto, kamo iya ga gahod …” (Quiet! Do your Lenten reflections, Christ is suffering, while all you do is make noise!), and we would quiet down, chastised. Well, one was not supposed to do heavy work, or even sweep the floor, on Thursday and Friday.

But a few years later, in the early ’70s, with “Jesus Christ Superstar,” it became somehow more acceptable to listen to a record of a rock opera during Holy Week. Later when the movie came out, there were ambivalent feelings about watching it, as some conservative religious leaders viewed it as blasphemous. Mary Magdalene falling for Jesus, singing “I Don’t Know How to Love Him,” a powerful Black Judas Iscariot, and a campy Pontius Pilate going honky-tonk with “So … you are the Christ, the great Jesus Christ …? Prove to me that you’re divine, change that water into wine …” But the image that stuck with me was also the soaring, pained, and agonizing “Gethsemane” — “Why should I die … You’re much too keen on where and how, and not so much on why …”

The centerpiece would be the processions of Holy Thursday and Good Friday, though in recent years only the Good Friday procession has been retained. Holy Thursday Masses would feature the washing of the feet of the apostles. One year, at the Beaterio de Molo, I had my feet washed too, but we had been told a couple of days before, so of course one bathes and wears new socks before going off to church.

On Good Fridays there is an early morning Via Crucis around town and the Visita Iglesia. In the ’70s I walked around the city, but for the past years I’ve done this on a bicycle. I try to do seven churches at least, in a little over 2.5 hours, doing a couple of stations in each church. The Good Friday afternoon services will include a reading of the Passion, and an adoration of the cross.

Over the years, more caros joined the Molo processions. Usually those of solitary female saints in mourning, though elegantly and richly tailored. There were 19 carrozas in 2025, up from 12 three decades ago. The procession starts with St. Peter, followed by Jesus on a donkey with palms, the Agony in the Garden, trial before Pilate, and so on. However, the Last Supper, with 13 life-size figures carved in Italy, is no longer in the procession. A typhoon damaged the shed containing it, decapitating some of the apostles. This massive caro was mounted on a truck and was too wide to enter the church.

The “star” is really the Santo Entierro, which has been with the Montelibano-Locsin-Sian-Hervas families for 170 years! Family members have a cherished tradition of preparing the elaborate bier, with the detailed carvings and accouterments, and the dead Christ with the ornate bandage around the head and jaw. Rose Martirez-Mijares, a descendant, stated in 2019: “The Santo Entierro will be about 164 years … now cared for by the 7th generation … The ornate cover of the Santo Entierro is hand-carved and covered with gold leaf. The black platform with silver ornamentation, where it is mounted, is part of the original piece.” It is said that during the Japanese occupation, the statue was ordered thrown into the river but instead was whisked off to safety. The Santo has pride of place in Holy Week processions — a band usually precedes it, playing a dirge, while in the background, one hears the soft murmuring of the rosary being prayed. The priest walks behind it. At the end of the procession is the Mater Dolorosa, in her black and silver gown, mournful face, and glass teardrops rolling down her cheeks.

One of the things we used to do while joining the procession was to collect candle wax drippings – we’d mold this into a ball, as big as a fist. An aunt would prepare “sansaw” — cool, sweet, and refreshing, made from muscovado sugar syrup, ice, with gelatin or agar-agar and sago balls. Molo’s procession meanders through streets named after saints – San Pedro, San Marcos, San Jose, San Mauricio, San Juan – and when the procession would reach our house on Avanceña Street, some 250 meters from the church, we’d stop off to watch the rest of the procession.

On Black Saturday, also known as “Sabado de Gloria,” there is a late-night Mass, marked by the declaration of one’s baptismal promises, and we gather outside for a candlelit procession; in a few hours it will be sunrise, and the glory of Easter morning, with the “Salubong” of the Risen Christ and the Blessed Mother, awaits, a fitting start to the holiest day of Christendom.