Mary's House of Succor

One of the first things that a Filipino Catholic learns in childhood is to call the Blessed Virgin Mary as Mama Mary as if she were his own mother.  As he puts more years into his life, he will hear mass in chapels and churches and attend schools named in her honor, or at least learn of schools and churches bearing her name.  In chapels and churches, he will never miss her statues, garbed in a variety of attires and addressed by a myriad of names.  At home or in a beloved’s abode, he will see Mary gracing the altar.

When his life hits a low point, especially if he feels that he is about to fall into an abyss, he might cry to the Blessed Virgin like a distressed child crying for his mother.  Among Mary’s many titles, the Mother of Perpetual Help is one of the more popular choices for seeking heavenly succor, with her shrine in Baclaran drawing devotees estimated to number more than a million annually.

A survey of the National Shrine of Our Mother of Perpetual Help, colloquially known as Baclaran after its site in Paranaque City, will reveal it to be just like other major churches in the Philippines and around the world for that matter:  imposing in size and design and ringed by roomy churchyards cooled by shady trees.

On Wednesdays, Baclaran stops from being just another church as it blooms with countless prayers.  Wednesday is the day when devotees beseech the Blessed Virgin for favors or praise her in thanksgiving.  Wednesdays have answered the question why Baclaran has become an icon and a powerful symbol of the Filipino Catholic’s Marian devotion.

The Novena to OurMother of Perpetual Help has a nomadic history.  Iloilo owns the honor of the novena’s birthplace in the Philippines in 1946.  In 1947, the Redemptorists brought the devotion to Batangas and finally to Baclaran, Paranaque, in 1948.  The Baclaran Church could accommodate only 300 people then and 70 attended the first Perpetual Help Novena in Baclaran.

From that small church, Baclaran has grown into a shrine that can accommodate 2,000 people on the pews and another 9,000 or more packed in the nave, aisles, churchyard, and even standing in front of the altar itself.  From the 70 initial attendees, approximately 100,000 men, women, and children currently flock to Baclaran on Wednesdays for the novenas and masses that start as early as 5:30 A.M.  Thousands more visit after the last novena at 7:00 P.M, on other days, and at any hour that if one were to count each soul that visits Baclaran every minute and every hour of each day, he can come up with a staggering number.

As a testament to the devotees’ burning faith in the Blessed Virgin Mary’s power to intercede, 4,004 letters imploring the Blessed Virgin for favors of almost any kind were collected in one week of September 2011 alone and 621 letters thanking Mary for petitions granted were received at the same time.  Out of the hundreds of thanksgiving letters dropped weekly at the church, the Redemptorist community picks one letter to read during the novenas.  In that letter, a devotee will share the granting of his petition, inspiring more people to pray for their personal miracles.

Another survey of the shrine will reveal that Baclaran has become a microcosm of Philippine society because the privileged, the destitute, the famous, the unknown, the healthy, the ill, the desperate, and the grateful congregate on its grounds, praying one prayer yet expressing it in different ways.  In Baclaran, one can pray in any manner that he wishes – kneeling, standing, kissing the foot of the altar, praying alone or with the community, even knocking on the tabernacle while muttering a private prayer.

As the home of the Our Mother of Perpetual Help, Baclaran is always open and its lights shining bright for the faithful.  Because its doors are never closed, anybody tearful from the worries of the world can wander inside and discover why millions of Catholics have called it as the house of their Mama Mary.

-Prospero Pulma Jr. -

The House of Succor

*Published in Short.Story.Me, April 28, 2012

Bathing in the light of magnesium, the shrine resembled a giant lamp drawing moths from the darkness, glowing brighter for the poorest of moths like Daniel standing by the gate. He looked at the buildings behind him as if he could see his father in their hovel, sleeping away his latest binge drinking. Then he remembered that he was in a city away from his father and his belt and broom. He looked behind him one last time before walking inside on his good leg.

Dan, get dressed. His mother used to whisper to him. We’re going to Baclaran. Daniel would immediately abandon his toys and playmates for the shrine that her mother and other people called Baclaran. He had asked his mother if it was Sunday because all that he could see from the shrine’s gate were people. Wednesday was her reply.

After cutting through the thicket of worshippers that stood between the gate and the church, she would unravel her chaplet at the narthex and kneel, approaching the altar on her knees. He would walk behind her, sometimes cheering her when she was faltering, oftentimes hopping on the aisle’s beige and green tiles.

Sometimes they would reach Baclaran close to suppertime and she would finish her weekly devotion late at night. Those were the nights when he would see the ragamuffins and homeless elderly retaking the shrine like natives reoccupying their land after the invaders’ departure. He heard the children laugh more than talk, and their laughter could jolt the bereaved back to living. They called playfully to him more than once. His mother’s chastising look burned each invitation.

Daniel and his mother had witnessed the shrine’s Liguorian Congregation rolling out casseroles of soup and watched the elderly queuing serenely while the snickering children would push one another off the line.

Just one bowl, mama. The aroma of the soup was so thick and inviting. They’re so excited to eat it.

I’ll tell your papa.

After Daniel’s mother had left her mortal shell, many Wednesdays passed without him straying to within sight of Baclaran.

It was not a Wednesday, so Daniel could see the church from the gate. Baclaranwas wearing the same beige paint and none of the outlying buildings looked new. Children were frolicking in the courtyard but they had adults hovering nearby. He looked deeper, sighing from not finding a ragamuffin. He strode inside on his good leg, the left leg unmolested by his father’s belt. His right limb was leathery from the welts that ranged from his knee to his ankle, with some old and fresh welts forming hazy boundaries. Ridges of skin thickened by the belt also crisscrossed his upper limbs and torso.

Daniel limped around the church, checking every pew where soiled blankets covered snoring bodies. He looked closer and saw that they were the homeless elderly. He saw children in the church, but they were clean and escorted by an adult. Where are you? He sat on a pew and scratched a fresh welt on his right knee, his father’s reward to him for leaving their supper’s dishes on the sink. Beside it was skin broken by his belt when Daniel did not wash the laundry. His calf was tender where his father had pummeled him with a broom for feeling dust biting at his bare soles after ordering Daniel to sweep the floor. Yet he was not a total beast to Daniel.

A boy and girl were playing on the chancel, waving at the altar and the portrait of a woman above the tabernacle his mother called Mama Mary. Daniel thought of joining the children, but a man called them. The boy genuflected while the girl blew a kiss to the altar before jumping off the chancel. One by one, the washed children were heading to their clean homes and beds.

Daniel circled the courtyard. It was free of the playing children and the spot where the Liguorians served soup was clean. Where are you?He whimpered. He thought of screaming to attract them but his mother’s screams in her battles with his father had brought half of their shantytown to their doorstep.

With his eyelids coming together more frequently and sticking together longer, he returned to the pew and stretched on the varnished plank. Baclaran never closes its doors. His mother had said when he asked her where the homeless go at midnight.

The wild children could frolic around him, but he would not run and play with them tonight. He would seek them in the morning. Perhaps they would remember him as the boy with the woman in the sweater. Many devotees had sinned from taking humorously at his mother’s wearing a sweatshirt in summer. If only they knew of the bruises and welts beneath the warm fabric. If only.

Prospero Pulma Jr.

Black Ribbons for Baclaran

Black Ribbons for Baclaran

A black ribbon denotes death and seeing black ribbons festooned on walls and pillars of the National Shrine of our Mother of Perpetual Help - Baclaran to its multitude of devotees - whispered that the Catholic Church is one priest less. It could not have come at a worse time when the Church is begging parents to offer one son for the priesthood and tugging at charitable hearts to support poor seminarians to boost the dwindling ranks of priests. The tents erected beside the church only heightened one’s anxiety. That was on Tuesday, the 16th.

Wednesday the 17th passed with me again visiting Baclaran, expecting an announcement that a member of the Redemptorist family had rejoined our Creator. The banner by the altar had a fresh slogan, “Linisin ang Baclaran, panatilihin ang kabanalan.” I read it halfheartedly as my mind was with the black ribbons. For the homily, the priest read an open letter, and that solved the mystery of the black ribbons.

The Redemptorist family has not lost one of its own. It is as strong as ever and in a fighting mood, charging into battle behind Article III Section 5 of the 1987 Philippine Constitution and the signatures, mine included, of the hordes that flock to Baclaran on Wednesdays. The contentious issue is Paranaque City’s Ordinance Number 025 series of 2011. On paper, the decree seeks to alleviate the plight of vendors outside the shrine by relocating them to stalls and off the pavement where they lay their wares. The regulation is commendable except for one detail: the local government will apparently erect the stalls right on the streets, worsening an already festering problem.

Anybody who has been to Baclaran would have noticed the vendors who have turned Redemptorist Road, Taft Avenue Extension, and the other adjoining streets into a sprawling flea market. Whether on foot or aboard a vehicle, a devotee would have felt encumbered by those stalls and vendors encroaching on the streets, reducing two-lane roads into alleys where pedestrians have to fight with vehicles for space. A good day of trading for venders means a bad day of travel for devotees, pedestrians and motorists. On those days, traffic nearly halts and the five-minute walk from the LRT Baclaran Station, approximately 200 meters away from the church, turns into a 10-minute stroll or a 20-minute procession.

There is also the issue of crime. Packing a multitude immersed in deep prayer into a small space will give the Artful Dodger and Fagin a field day. Lady devotees are favorite targets, according to reports, but the fiends do not exclusively prey on women. The reminders over the PA system only reinforce the notion that nobody is safe even in the house of God.

Violence is another issue, having witnessed a Waray and a Maranao arguing heatedly near the statue of St. Therese no less. I hastily said my prayers when the Maranao started boasting that his cavalry is coming, but the Waray and his buddy, another Waray, calmly took the threat. Two Warays bloodying each other is bad enough. Warays and Maranaos brawling is Ultimate Fight Club meets World Wrestling Entertainment Raw.

Do not get me wrong. The vendors are as needy as most Baclaran devotees, and if I were them, I would be in the shrine begging for the Blessed Virgin’s intercession. I would rather have them force me to buy their bootleg DVDs and other goods than have them force my cell phone and money out of my pockets at knifepoint. When I can, I buy from them, but Baclaran devotees have their rights, too, as what the priest emphasized, and the vendors’ right to earn has long stepped on our right to worship at the National Shrine of our Mother of Perpetual Help without having to go through a gauntlet of venders and fiends.

Prospero Pulma Jr. -