Ati-atihan in Aklan and Sinulog Festival in Cebu are all well-known festivals that will be celebrated on this month of January.
I was wondering how these two pagan festivals became Christian. I was searching information in the Municipal Library of Malitbog (Southern Leyte) but I didn’t found anything about it. But do you know what information I found during my researches?
Did you know that the Roman Catholic Church in Benguet adopted an Igorot pagan practice? Here’s what was written on the Manila Daily Bulletin, dated August 13, 1968:
“LA TRINIDAD, Benguet, August 12 (PNS). An experiment on the incorporation of some sound Igorot pagan practices into the Catholic church’s religious ceremonies was successfully conducted by the Sabangan parish church under Rev. Fr. Wilfredo Daels in Mountain Province recently.
“This was the blending of the ‘tengao,’ an Igorot pagan harvest festival, and the traditional Catholic thanksgiving rites into one united religious observance.
“The pagan festival of dances was held immediately after the mass…
“With the success of the first combined pagan-Catholic church ‘tengao,’ the Sabangan folk will no longer have divided thanksgiving celebration.”
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