Bohol Churches

Bohol Churches

The Spanish made their mark in many ways on this archepligo that stretches over seven thousand islands. Along with pestilance, slavery, and oppression, they gave the Phillipino people an overwhelming desire to love God. The Catholic religion is so strong here, every motor vehicle seems to have some sort of slogan on it asking some saint or holy figure to watch over the driver, the vehicle, or both.
The churches that were built around the islands by the Spanish are all old. The church in Loboc were I celebrated Christmas mass was just being finished as the British were facing defeat at Yorktown in 1781, and this was a fairly young church by Phillipino standards. The churches at Albuqurqe and Blaycon were older dating from the early part of the seventeenth century, before the pilgrams who landed at Plymouth rock were even born.
The following pictures are just five of the many I took of churches around Bohol. They are mostly built of either coral or the native limestone and all are showing the ravages of being in the tropics, yet, in their age, they still serve a puropse. Every day they are still filled with the faithful coming to Mass, Communion, and Confession with Phillipino priests saying the sacred Mass in the native Tagalong langauge.
It is a exquisite site to see these almost mystical monuments to Catholicism, even to a cynic like myself. To me, a pretty much lapsed Catholic, it has almost made me want to start attending Mass again.

Pictures-
1. The church in Loboc were I went to Christmas Mass. It was packed when I arrived for the midnight service as the world famous choir of Loboc sang hymes from on top of a sagging balcony.
2. The black Jesus from inside the Loboc church. Outside, in the back, there is also a black Madonna.
3. The inside of the church at Balycon. Even with the paint peeling after three hundred years the magic of the sacristy still shines through.
4. A front view of the church at Albequrque, the second oldest stone church in the Phillipenes, built in 1589
5. The archway connecting the church and rectory of the Balycon church with the afternoon light shining through. I met a man named Jorge here who gave me a great insiders tour of the church. He told me that his great grandfather had been chrisitned by the last Spanish priest left in Bohol in 1898 and his family told stories about how their ansectors had helped to cut the stone that the church was made from.