The other Sto. Niño

Last week, I wrote about the contested finding of the Sto. Niño, made more problematic by the annual reenactment in San Nicolas, Cebu City, of its finding every April 28.

This is but one example of what the anthropologist Astrid Sala-Boza refers to as counterfactuals, misconceptions, mistranslations or misinterpretations of otherwise extant historical documents that are open to scrutiny at their very sources.

Sala-Boza cites the Augustinian historian Fr. Isacio Rodriguez, who, until his recent demise, was the director of the library and archives of the Agustinos Filipinos de Valladolid in Spain. Fr. Rodriguez, who also carried out a long mission and parish work in Manila and Iloilo, is famous for his magnum opus, the multi-volume “Historia de la Provincia Agustiniana de Smo. Nombre de Jesus de Filipinas.” In the first of this 30-plus volume work, Sala-Boza finds three notarized documents or “Tantos Juridicos” and the “Relacion del Viaje y Jornada” of the Legazpi expedition in which Fr. Rodriguez clearly settles the issue of the contested finding of the Sto. Niño—and it is not in San Nicolas.

The first document refers to the book “History of the Augustinian Order in Spain” (published in March 1916), which mentions four times “that the image was brought from the place where it was found to a temporary church.” According to Fr. Rodriguez, the initial procession, church and placement of the image in that particular church at that time were at best temporary or provisional, being barely days after the discovery of the image.

The second is a notarized document, dated Oct. 6, 1566 and witnessed by many, which dictates Legazpi’s grants to the Sto. Niño convent. It mentions that the Augustinian Fr. Andres de Urdaneta, navigator of the Legazpi expedition, “requested him (Legazpi) to designate the house where the Holy Infant was found as the location for their church and monastery.” A third grant by Legazpi, dated July 9, 1570, already mentions, in fact, that a temporary church (one of light materials) had already been built.

The third evidence is another notarized document dated Jan. 10, 1592 ratifying the land grants made by Legazpi in favor of the convent of the Sto. Niño. This act was the result of a lawsuit filed by Augustian friars against the local Spanish authorities urging them to recognize Legazpi’s grants to them.

The fourth document is a detailed plan of the possessions of the Augustinian mission in Cebu. The plan, dated Jan. 16, 1592, is stored at the archives in Valladolid. It reportedly shows the church and convent of the Sto. Niño (then called San Agustin) with a rendition of the Augustinian symbol, a pierced heart, in red and this description: “where the venerated image of the Sto. Niño was found by the venerable Fr. And. De Urdaneta.”

The fifth and final historical proof is in the “Relacion del Viaje y Jornada” of the Legazpi expedition. It says clearly that the location of the humble house where the Holy Infant was found was designated as the location for the Augustinian monastery, adding that “even if at present the church is in another part that is borrowed (the church was in another area) until they could build the house there. From that house, the Child Jesus was brought to the said church in solemn procession [with] great devotion, rejoicing and festivity by all [the Spaniards] in the camp … ”

By citing these five sources and inviting the reader to understand how fiction can sometimes become real with a little embellishment here and there, Astrid Sala-Boza has clearly set the record straight in providing the direct unassailable provenance of the Sto. Niño vis-a-vis the minor basilica that now bears its name.

This debunking of the myth of San Nicolas was but a section in the two-volume doctoral dissertation she submitted to the University of San Carlos, which I invite everyone to find time to read.

It is, finally, important to note that the house on which the image was found was in fact not that of a noble but that of a slave. Juan de Camus, the Spanish soldier credited with finding the image, found not one but three boxes, two of them tied together. The first box he opened contained a boar’s tusk and a bowl or large cup while the second box was empty.

The third box was tied with yarn from a ship’s sail. Inside this box was another pine box (or cradle in other versions), where the Sto. Niño was kept still wearing its flounced shirt and a small red velvet hat, not the golden crown that we see today. There are stories, unfortunately aired many times by a local television reporter of a national broadcasting company in last Sunday’s Sinulog, that the image was found floating in the sea.

It is, in fact, in the lowliness of the abode in which the miraculous image was kept waiting for 44 years until the accidental finding by Juan de Camus that began the series of other stories of miracles, of the Sto. Niño roaming around the city, or buying fish in Carbon market—stories that continue to this day.

Pit Señor everyone!