Spending Maundy Thursday

Thursday morning was a super sweaty one. I woke up drenched in my own sweat due to the power maintenance the admin of our building was scheduled to do that day. Good thing, we have the Visita Iglesia to keep us occupied the whole morning as opposed to having to stay here in our place waiting for the power to be revived.

Visita Iglesia is one of the renowned activities that most Catholic Filipino families do during the Holy Week. People doing the said activity visit seven churches which is said to have originated from early Christian customs of visiting the seven basilicas of Rome for adoration , though some expand the visit to 14 churches indicative of the 14 stations of the cross.

Our Lady of Mount Carmel Parish in Quezon City

We are always game to visit 14 churches because of the ease of finding that much number of churches around the metro. Taking into consideration the overflowing presence in number of churches just in Luzon makes me take a second glance on how Christianity gradually spread all over the country during the long reign of the Spaniards in our country and those earlier decades of our history.

The National Shrine of the Sacred Heart in Makati City

In fulfilment of this Holy Week obligation and the seemingly exponentially growing attachment of us, individuals, to the world wide web, the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) had also introduced lately the Visita Iglesia online in their website which is an alternative for those Catholics who cannot accomplish the said obligation due to  a number of reasons. This features know churches such as the Manila Cathedral Basilica, San Agustin Church, Minor Basilica of the Black Nazarene, San Lorenzo Ruiz Church, Santo Nino de Tondo Church, Nuestra Senora de Remedios and Our Lady of Perpetual Help Shrine complete with songs that you can play in the background and prayers to be read at each station. We, on the other hand, make the activity more personal by just uttering our own little prayer to Him in every church that we visit. After all, observing Holy Week is not about having the most number of churches visited and covered in a day nor the most number of hours spent on indifferently reciting established prayers barefoot or kneeling nor doing a ton of hollow sacrifices but by commemorating the sacrifice that He had done for our salvation and thanking Him for every bit of thing and favor He is relentlessly giving us.