TAGBILARAN CITY –– For the first time, Grace Dagangon-Macarayan is celebrating Christmas away from family in Bohol.
Macarayan, 38, a call center agent in Cebu City, took a two-day leave to go home to Barangay Bunga Mar in Jagna town, Bohol on Tuesday, Dec. 24, but her 8 a.m. trip was canceled due to Tropical Storm “Ursula.”
She said it was the first time she would miss Christmas Eve away from her four sons––Ace Yuan, 10; Miguel, 8; Gabriel, 5; and Raphael, 3.
“I am really sad because it is our tradition to be together on Christmas eve,” said Macarayan whose husband works overseas.
Macarayan said that every Christmas eve, she would bring her four boys to the St. Michael the Archangel Parish Church in Barangay Poblacion to attend Mass and witness the town’s centuries-old tradition of “Padagan sa Kometa” (Gliding of the Comet).
Church records of celebrating the “Padagan sa Kometa” dates back in 1867 when parishioners were first documented decorating the church with lanterns every Christmas season and taking them down on the Feast of Epiphany.
“I’d been used to witness it since I was a kid. I want to see it with my children during Christmas,” she said.
The “kometa” measures about three meters and its tail is even bigger and longer.
The lights inside the church are dimmed to emphasize the “kometa.” When the choir Pastorela Chorale sings the “Gloria in Excelsis Deo,” it would glide on a guide rope towards the altar passing through the 12 stars evenly hanging near the ceiling.
When the “kometa” approaches the nativity scene at the altar, it would go down thrice to pay homage to the child Jesus.
Stretching and displaying its long tail, the “kometa” would then be in place above the Belen, where it would remain until the Feast of the Three Kings.
Instead of crying, Macarayan said she swapped schedules with her colleague at work on Tuesday until midnight.
She said she would call her children to greet them. “This is the saddest Christmas I am away from them. Only Ursula disrupted the celebration but never my love for my children,” she quipped./lzb