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BAGUIO, Philippines — The people of Ilocos Sur are hanging on to faith, that a miracle that happened 400 years ago can happen again today.
On Holy Wednesday, April 8, they prayed that “Apo Lakay,” the statue of the Señor Santo Cristo Milagroso de Sinait, believed to be miraculous, will save the world from a cruel virus that has claimed more than 70,000 lives and infected over a million people globally.
Even as religious gatherings for the Holy Week have been discouraged to prevent further community transmission, the provincial government of Ilocos Sur led by Governor Ryan Luis Singson and the Archdiocese of Nueva Segovia under Bishop Marlo Mendoza Peralta brought Apo Lakay from Sinait, the northernmost town, to Lidlidda town down to the national highway from Tagudin to Vigan and back to Sinait.
It was a convoy from dawn till dusk. Along the way, the faithful knelt on the road with their rosaries and statues- still observing physical distancing, a precautionary measure advised by experts to avoid getting infected by the pathogen.
“Apo Lakay, espalen na kami!” some of the faithful shouted. (Holy Father, save us!)
Epidemic in the 1800s
It was the same prayer that their ancestors made when a cholera epidemic swept through Vigan in 1882, killing nearly a thousand people in the Ilocos Coast – from Pangasinan to Ilocos Norte – which had a population then of half a million.
Biguenos asked their parish priest, Fr. Evaristo Abaya, to bring Apo Lakay to Vigan.
Apo Lakay arrived in Vigan the next year, and a daily novena was arranged.
The number of fatalities from cholera gradually declined. The people said that the deaths stopped on the last day of the novena.
Mention “Apo Lakay” to the people in Sinait, Ilocos Sur, and they will bring you to the Parish of San Nicolas de Tolentino where the statue of the Señor Santo Cristo Milagroso de Sinait is enshrined.
Crucified Christ
“Apo Lakay” came to Sinait exactly 400 years ago. In 1620, a box was found floating in Dadalaquiten village located in what is now the border of Sinait and Badoc towns, between Ilocos Sur and Norte.
The box contained the statues of a Crucified Christ and the Virgin Mary with the Infant Jesus in her arms and cherubs on the sides.
It was said that the statues were almost impossible to carry to the shore.
But the fishermen, curiously, were able to do so. The Badoc fishermen brought the Virgin Mary and Infant Jesus to the town. The Sinait fishermen carried the Crucified Christ.
This was how the Virgin Mary became known as the La Virgen Milagrosa de Badoc, or Apo Baket, and the Crucified Christ became the Señor Santo Cristo Milagroso de Sinait, also known as Apo Lakay.
One COVID-19 positive
When the coronavirus outbreak began, Singson tried to secure Ilocos Sur’s borders by imposing a community quarantine on March 15.
But a 55-year-old mother in Tagudin, the province’s southernmost town, was confirmed to have COVID-19 last March 29, becoming the first, and by far only, coronavirus case in the province.
She was said to have been infected by her son who came from the United States on March 8, and manifested symptoms 10 days later. She is now confined in a La Union hospital.
Ilocos Sur’s tally showed that the number of patients under investigation (PUIs) reached as many as 62, but 50 of them have already been discharged from the hospitals and only 12 others remain confined.
From 18,875 persons under monitoring (PUMs), only 2,396 remain under quarantine. The rest have been cleared.
As of Wednesday afternoon, the coronavirus cases in the country has soared to 3,870. The Department of Health (DOH) said 182 of them have died, while 96 patients have recovered. (READ: PH coronavirus cases rise to 3,870, deaths at 182)
The late great historian Isabelo delos Reyes noted in the 1890s that the people of Ilocos Sur were among the most pious in the country especially during Holy Week.
This religiosity never wavered even a century later.
The consensus here is that by May 3, the feast of the founding of the Holy Cross and the feast of Apo Santo Cristo Milagroso of Sinait, the whole world would be healed. – Rappler.com
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