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Homonhon Island the Correct Site of the First Mass in the Philippines: A Book Review

2023, ASIAN JOURNAL OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND LEGAL STUDIES

This review intends to examine the merits of the book entitled, Homonhon Island: The Correct Site of the First Mass in the Philippines written by Msgr. Lope C. Robredillo, SThD. The author presents his arguments using a sociological-theological approach against proponents of Butuan, Limasawa and Bolinao Islands, who earlier were claimed to be the correct site of the first Mass, respectively. The book contains 4 chapters the first of which deals with a historical background of the current sites of the first Mass while the rest focus on the author's arguments backed up by logical reasoning and a revisit of Antonio Pigafetta's accounts. Content analysis revealed themes of diversity, regionalism, and dynamism characterizing the historian's representations of their narratives. The rich discussion and well-organized layout of interesting data that are rarely found in other theological books make this masterpiece a must-read for historians, scholars, teachers, and students probing into the controversy behind the true site of the first mass in the Philippines.

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The Philippine archipelago is described here as “twice discovered” by virtue of the significance Cebuanos place upon two events of Spanish arrival. In both the formal and casual remembrance of their city’s historical legacy, Cebuanos invariably invoke the momentous arrivals of Magellan and Legazpi, citing the religious ceremonies of baptism or “first mass” that gave them poignancy. Indeed, the significance of these moments can be located in Spanish and Cebuano interpretations of one little figure – one that still stands enshrined in the city today. This essay describes how the history Cebuanos remember is a pervasive retelling of a particular allegory in which the Santo Nino “figures” as the most decisive actor. The question asked here is this: how does the “figuring”of the Santo Nino provide the conditions of possibility for which both the Cebuano and the Spaniard came to perceive their encounter as specifically divine? How is “discovery” construed as both a geographical act of mapping and naming, and a spiritual one of conversion and baptism? The sections that follow will examine the allegorical underpinnings of “discovery” and the divine and holy events of “finding” that foreground and define it. It is in this way that we may be able to understand how forts and crosses in Cebu have become imbued with a “sacred” and powerful aura that underscores their significance in Cebuano and indeed Philippine history.

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In 1983, the National Historical Institute of the Republic of the Philippines placed a historical marker on the front left side of the Our Lady of the Assumption Cathedral, a two-hundred-year-old structure located in Maasin City, Southern Leyte, Philippines. This Cathedral is the seat of the now half-acentury-old Diocese of Maasin. While pursuing a larger research project, entitled "Cataloguing and baselining the seven Filipino-Spanish churches of the Diocese of Maasin, " which was funded by the National Commission on Culture and the Arts of the Republic of the Philippines, the research team was able to uncover glaring errors in such a historical marker. This paper addresses these errors, explains their possible causes/sources, and proposes a more historically accurate text that can be used to revise this important historical marker.

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There is no doubt that the Philippines is a country loaded with natural assets, its topography could explain that the nation could flourish in its agriculture. Because of it being an archipelago, it isn't astounding any longer that the Philippines is consisted of various races, some of them are Indonesian, Chinese, Arab, Indian, Spanish, American, and Negrito. This is a strong verification or a solid proof that the Philippines is a wealthy country in culture, custom, and tradition, and that even before colonizers showed up in our country, Filipinos have their own character or identity . It could be a disheartening reality, but widespread bondage and class battle and class struggle already existed even before unfamiliar foreign colonization; Rajas, Sultans, and Maharlikas are those part of the authoritative class, while the Timawas are those people who serve the authoritative class. Shreds of evidence and proof of water system framework, weapons, writing or literature, and painstaking handicrafts work discovered and unearthed by archeologists and anthropologists shows that Filipinos are a long and far way from the indios that the Spanish colonizers called our progenitors.

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Butuan or Limasawa: The Site of the First Mass in the Philippines: A Reexaminationof the Evidence

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Limasawa or Butuan? Debates continue on where first Mass was held

Fr. Marvin Mejia reads the historical account of the first baptism in the Philippines during a press conference for the activities for the quincentennial anniversary on the arrival of Christianity in the country this 2021. | Gerard Francisco

CEBU CITY, Philippines —— With the quincentennial celebration approaching, the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) hopes the debates on the true location of the first Mass will finally be resolved.

Fr. Marvin Mejia, secretary-general of the CBCP, said the matter was still being looked into by the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP) and the Association of Church Historians in the Philippines.

The first Mass and the first baptism are the two major historical ecclesiastical events that are given focus in the quincentennial celebrations sanctioned by the CBCP and the Archdiocese of Cebu.

Cebu is identified as the site of the first baptism with Rajah Humabon, Queen Juana and hundreds of their community members being the first converts, according to the accounts of Antonio Pigafetta, the chronicler of the Magellan-Elcano expedition.

The first baptism was on April 14, 1521.

According to Pigafetta, the first Mass was celebrated on March 31, 1521, an Easter Sunday. Pigafetta referred to the venue as “Mazaua.”

Some say that the venue is the island of Limasawa in Leyte. Others, however, claim that Pigafetta was referring to Masao the community at the mouth of Agusan River adjacent to what is now the city of Butuan.

Nearing 500 years since the first Mass, debates continue whether it was held on Limasawa Island, in Agusan or somewhere else.

“As far as our history books, the first Mass is in Limasawa. But there are other places that are claiming that the first Mass was held in their locality. The historical commission somehow opens the discussion among experts and historians,” Mejia said.

Read more: Archdiocese of Cebu to highlight first baptism in 2021 quincentennial celebrations

Mejia attended the Archdiocese of Cebu’s press conference on Wednesday, November 13, which tackled about the plans of the Catholic church for the quincentennial celebration.

They announced that to commemorate the first baptism, 500 children with special needs would be baptized in the Basilica Minore del Santo Niño in Cebu City on April 14, 2021.

The first Mass, on the other hand, shall be celebrated across the country as it will be commemorated on the Easter of 2021 which falls on April 12.

This way, Mejia said, the first Mass would be well celebrated and commemorated by all churches regardless of where the true site would be.

“Even if the issue is not yet resolved, the celebration and the commemoration would still happen,” said Mejia.

He said that it would be up to the dioceses who were claiming to be the site of the first Mass if they would hold a big event for the Easter Mass./dbs

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Resolving debate on site of first Mass in PH

Eight months into the official rites for the 500th anniversary of the first Mass in the country, a set of evidence was presented to refute historical accounts that the contingent of world voyager Ferdinand Magellan held the event in Limasawa, Southern Leyte.

Dr. Potenciano Malvar, chair of the Butuan Calagan Historical Cultural Foundation, will assert that the first Mass was held at another site in Mindanao in the soon-to-be-published book, “Site of the 1521 Easter Mass, Butuan Not Limasawa.”

“It is my desire that this manuscript shall initiate the National Historical Commission of the Philippines to unlock and expose the concocted and fabricated published versions of the existing, disputable site of where the Easter Mass continued to be celebrated,” he said in the introduction to the 144-page draft.

Malvar, a 75-year-old doctor, spent five years of research in the country and abroad to help resolve a dispute that a 1959 law, two panels in 1998 and 2009, and several appeals had failed to settle.

“I conclude with complete confidence that it was Butuan,” he told the Inquirer in a recent telephone interview.

According to him, those determining the actual site should first have in mind that the goal of the voyage of the Magellan-led Armada de Moluccas was to reach the Spice Islands using the westward route and trade.

CELEBRATING CHRISTIANITY A monu of ment depicting fir the first Mass in st Butuan City fe Ma atures the images ss of Portuguese ex in plorer Ferdinan PH d Magellan with Rajah Kolambu, the King of Butuan, and his brother, Rajah Siagu, the King of Mazaua. The commemorative site is at Bood Promontory Ecopark, built on a hill overlooking Masao River, or El Rio de Butuan. —ERWIN MASCARIÑAS

‘Disguised’

On the order of Spain’s King Charles 1, Magellan, in a 1521 map, “disguised the island of Spice by putting the latitudes at 9 ⅔ degree latitude and cartographed those islands of Mindanao and Visayas by making South, North and East, West.”

The logs of six sailors of the three ships in the expedition also concealed the location of Butuan Island. “Magellan intended them to have contrasting latitude,” Malvar said. “So the 9 ⅔ degree latitude and the purpose of the cartographs were to conceal.”

He said the Limasawa proponents “need to explain why if the 9 ⅔ latitude was that land they wanted to go, why was there a need for Magellan to cartograph those islands that way?”

King Charles’ order on April 19, 1519, read in part: “I know for certain, according to the much information which I have obtained from persons who have seen it by experience, that there are spices in the islands of Maluco; and chiefly, you are going to seek them with this said fleet and my will is that you should straightaway follow the voyage to the said islands in the form and guise which I have said and commanded to you, the said Ferdinand Magallanes.”

A copy of the order is kept in the Archivo General de Indias in Seville, Spain.

Concealment was practiced for centuries by Arab and Chinese traders, Malvar said. An order, dated May 8, 1519, by the Casa Contratacion, also owned by the king, gave Magellan instructions on how to treat and trade with the natives.

Malvar said these negotiations were not known to the chronicler Antonio Pigafetta, who was taught by Magellan to keep secrets after warning that “unauthorized people caught with a chart from his cabinet in the ship faced death.”

The site where Magellan erected a cross with crown was documented by Francisco Albo, who kept an official logbook of the voyage.

It was “upon a mountain,” locating Butuan Island at 9 ⅓ degree North latitude. Later, King Charles referred to this as the proof of his conquest of the Spice Islands.

BISHOP’S ORDER The unpublished book “Butuan not Limasawa” features a copy of a 1581 edict (right) by Manila Bishop Domingo de Salazar, which declared “El Capella Butuan” as site of the Easter Mass celebrated on March 31, 1521 (Julian calendar), or April 8, 1521 (Gregorian calendar).

No ‘Limasawa’

Malvar said Mazaua, an island near Butuan, was replaced with the word Limasawa in the preface of the “First Voyage Around the World” by James Alexander Robertson and Emma Helen Blair that was published in December 1907.

The authentic Pigafetta manuscript has no word Limasawa, Malvar said, attributing the change to a third editor, Edward Gaylord Bourne.

“Limasawa at 9 degree 55’ latitude was very far north of the 9 ⅓ degree North latitude,” he noted to eliminate Limasawa.

Congressional archives of Republic Act No. 2733, the 1959 law that declared Limasawa as official site of the first Mass, showed “many irregularities,” Malvar said.

Of the 39 lawmakers, only 11 were present when the bill was approved.

Proponents, even Church leaders, were not invited to committee hearings. No ocular visits were done. The law did not bear the signature of then President Carlos Garcia.

Malvar also found out that the Gancayco panel, in its 1998 report, deleted six sentences in Pigafetta’s accounts because these would “debunk the Limasawa claim.” The panel was created by the former National Historical Institute in 1996 to resolve issues in the country’s history.

According to Malvar, among the deleted portions was that the Easter Mass happened in the domain of the first king, Raia Colambu, which was Butuan. Magellan’s setting up of tokens —cross and crown—was deleted although this confirmed the conquest. The items were not found though to this date.

The “bull’s eye” against Limasawa was the three actions that Pigafetta recounted but were deleted in the Gancayco report: “The ships fired all their artillery at once when the body of Christ was elevated, the signal having been [given] from the shore with muskets.”

These, Malvar said, could not be done all at the same time in Limasawa because Magellan’s shrine and landing are 700 meters apart.

He said “Conquistas de las Islas Filipinas 1565-1615,” a chronicle of Miguel Lopez de Legazpi’s expedition by Gaspar de San Agustin, extolled the exploits of Magellan in Butuan, 44 years after the explorer was killed in Mactan.

“[The natives and king] built him a house and during Easter, the First Mass celebrated [on] these islands was held in Butuan and the First Cross was raised, which Ferdinand Magellan himself placed on a hill not very far from the beach … ”

The same chronicle mentioned Butuan, describing it thus: “That on Masagua there was a town located to the east with a port for the ships on the west side of the island.”

Disappeared

Malvar said the evidence that Mazaua Island existed was a 1683 map by Augustinian Recolletos. The island disappeared in a 1902 map because earthquakes had fused it with the mainland while siltation by floods filled it. The present day Mazaua is thought to be Barangay Masao, one of the 85 villages of Butuan City.

Using a 1739 map, Malvar tracked Pigafetta’s distance of 35 leguas (legua is an obsolete unit of length; 1 legua is equivalent to 3 miles, or 4.84 kilometers) from Mazaua to Gatigan to Zzubu. The distance between Limasawa and Zzubu was less than 20 leguas, however.

Malvar twice doubted if Limasawa could supply spice, citing the large haul of the ship Victoria when it returned to Spain. Also, the tadpole shape of Limasawa contrasted Pigafetta’s cartograph of Mazaua Island.

Jesuit priest Rey Pedro Chirino’s “Relaciones de las Islas Filipinas” mentioned the missionary activities of the Jesuits from 1581 and the Recolletos in 1622 in Butuan. Books by five missionaries dated 1663, 1667, 1787 and 1818 chronicled the growth and forms of Catholic faith in Butuan.

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Then, too, the first bishop of Manila, Domingo de Salazar, issued an edict in 1581 declaring “El Capella Butuan” the site where the Easter Mass was celebrated on March 31, 1521.

The edict was published in a special newspaper supplement published in 1926, a copy of which is in the archives of the Archdiocese of Manila.

In Butuan, there was also a group called “Folks of Magallanes” that celebrated the Easter Mass for 300 years until 2000 at the Carballo Monument. The date of the Mass was on April 8, 1521, following the Gregorian calendar.

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‘First Easter Sunday mass was held in Limasawa’ --- Nat’l Historical Commission

After decades of debate, the long-standing issue of the exact location of the Easter Sunday Mass celebrated by Fr. Pedro Valderama during the Magellan-Elcano expedition on March 31, 1521 was finally resolved by the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP). 

In a statement released on August 18, the NHCP affirmed the findings of the investigation conducted by the panel of scholars that the commission created in 2018, recommending the recognition of Limasawa, located in today’s Southern Leyte, as the site of the said event.

The date on which the Spaniards first set foot in the Philippines may have been well-established in history books.   But there was controversy on the site of the first Easter Sunday Mass celebrated in 1521 that emerged in the last years of the 19th century and the early decades of the 20th century.  This came about when both foreign and local historical research scholars of that period shifted their view from the traditionally recognized site of Butuan in Agusan del Norte to Limasawa island in Leyte. 

Revisiting historical problem

According to NHCP, the issue as to the exact location of the said mass was first resolved by its forerunner, the National Historical Institute (NHI), through two panels of experts: the first headed by former Supreme Court Justice Emilio Gancayco in 1995 and the second by historian Dr. Benito J. Legarda in 2008. 

“Both panels ruled that the site of the 1521 Easter Sunday Mass was Limasawa island, now a municipality in Southern Leyte,” it said. 

In 2018, the NHCP received a number of requests from various institutions, including the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), to reexamine the earlier decisions of the NHI. 

These requests were made in the light of new primary sources and pieces of evidence that surfaced recently which were not taken into consideration by the previous panels. 

With the mandate to “actively engage in the settlement or resolution of controversies or issues relative to historical personages, places, dates and events,” based on Republic Act No. 10086 or Strengthening People’s Nationalism Act of 2009, NHCP chair Dr. Rene Escalante decided to reopen the historical problem in the interest of fairness and to further enrich historical literature.

Coincidentally, President Rodrigo Duterte signed Executive Order 55 on May 8, 2018, that announced the commencement of preparations for the 500th year anniversary (Quincentennial) of the Christianization of the Philippines. 

In one of its provisions, EO 55 states that various entities have been proposing to the NHCP the conduct of certain activities for the commemoration of the 500th anniversary of the arrival of Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan in the Philippines, the celebration of the First Mass in the Philippines, the circumnavigation of the globe by Ferdinand Magellan-Juan Elcano, the victory of Lapu-Lapu in the Battle of Mactan, and other events associated to the matter. 

The celebration began in 2019 and will end in 2022.

“It is in this context that the National Quincentennial Committee (NQC) through its Executive Director, NHCP chair Dr. Rene Escalante, reopened the case of a controversy in Philippine history,” a copy of a final report of the Mojares Panel on the Butuan-Limasawa controversy said, which was submitted to the NHCP on January 10, 2020. 

Creation of a new panel 

The NHCP created a new and highly distinguished panel of experts in November 2018 to reexamine the historical controversy and review the findings of the previous panels. It was created in such a way that each discipline in the said field of study will be equally represented. 

It was headed by historian and National Artist for Literature Dr. Resil Mojares.  Members  of the panel included national and internationally recognized-historians, paleographers, and translators from various academic institutions in the Philippines and Asia. 

“NHCP chair Dr. De Rene Escalante made sure that no member of the panel came from either Agusan del Norte or Southern Leyte so that their decision would be based primarily on evidence and sound analysis, and not on regional or territorial biases,” the NHCP said. 

The CBCP was also represented by other church historians as observers of the panel’s proceedings. 

Mojares Panel’s Tasks 

The six-person panel of scholars headed by Mojares was tasked to review the results of the earlier panels created by the NHI and the position papers submitted by the pro-Butuan and pro-Limasawa advocates. 

They reassessed the studies and literature on the historical issue, gathered the extant copies of Venetian scholar and explorer Antonio Pigafetta’s chronicles and other accounts abroad. 

They also surveyed the presumed sites of the event in Butuan and Limasawa and consulted experts in geology and cartography. 

To note, among the best known accounts of the Magellan-Elcano circumnavigation was written by Pigafetta, who was one of the 18 Europeans aboard the Victoria ship at its return. 

The Butuan-Limasawa controversy

Based on the Mojares panel report, a monument commemorating the first mass in the Philippines was erected near the mount of the Agusan River in 1872. The place is known today as the municipality of Magellan. 

The report cited Jesuit historian  Miguel Bernad’s essays on the reexamination of the evidence, citing that the “monument  is a testimonial to the tradition that remained vigorous until the end of the 19th century, mainly that Magellan and his expedition landed at Butuan and celebrated there the First Mass ever offered in the Philippines.”

But as many writers tried to retell what transpired in the past, the panel said several versions of the Butuan tradition have been altered due to misinformation or, simply, the process of copying accounts from the previous historical versions that would, in turn, be copied anew by those who came after. 

The report submitted by the panel also noted that Pigafetta gave a copy of his book about the first voyage around the world to the Regent Mother Louisa of Emperor Francis, who had it translated into French by philosopher Jacques Antoine Frabe. 

But a scholar cited in the report said Fabre "made only a summary, leaving out the things that were too detailed, and which was printed in French with too many errors.”

Meanwhile, the shift to the Limasawa tradition happened following the publication of the Da Moto transcription and the examination of the log of Victoria’s pilot, Francisco Albo. 

“The log appeared for the first time in the collection of documents published by Martin Fernandez de Navarette in 1837. Upon the study of these two sources, two Philippine scholars--- Trinidad Pardo de Tavera and Fr. Pablo Pastelles, SJ --- concluded that it was a historical error that Butuan was deemed the site of the First Easter Sunday Mass,” it said.

With this, Pardo de Tavera first published the findings in an article in El Comercio in 1895. 

In 1921, in celebration of the Quadricentennial of the arrival of the Magellan Expedition in the Philippines, he wrote the program for the Limasawa Exhibit establishing the fact that the first mass was celebrated in Limasawa. Several scholars from the early 20th century then followed the same account affirming that the historical event happened in Limasawa, not in Butuan.

Three-decade contention

But the panel said the change of the site was not taken lightly, especially by Butuan residents and pro-Butuan scholars. 

“The contention lasted for over three decades as these proponents wrote to the local and national government (including the President) petitioning for these authorities to issue a decision that would transfer the First Easter Sunday Mass Site back to Butuan," it said.

The first official government action taken on this controversy was done through the NHI in 1980 and was followed by the formation of the aforementioned panels in 1995 and 2008. 

Finally resolved 

Just this year, the decades-long debate has ended. 

The panel unanimously agreed that the pieces of evidence and arguments presented by the pro-Butuan advocates are not sufficiently convincing to warrant the repeal or reversal of the ruling on the case by the NHI, according to the NHCP. 

On July 15, 2020, the NHCP Board of Commissioners also adopted Resolution No. 2, which cites the recommendation of the Mojares Panel that Limasawa Island In Southern Leyte be officially declared as the site of the  first Easter Sunday Mass in the Philippines that was held in 1521.

But the panel recommended to the NHCP and to the Butuan-based scholars to explore further the historical significance of Butuan as a pre-colonial trading center. 

“Butuan has a lot of archeological artifacts and cultural traditions that could be used to promote the city as a one of the country’s premier historic sites,” it said. 

Sweeping Raids, Giant Camps and Mass Deportations: Inside Trump’s 2025 Immigration Plans

If he regains power, Donald Trump wants not only to revive some of the immigration policies criticized as draconian during his presidency, but expand and toughen them.

Donald Trump wants to reimpose a Covid 19-era policy of refusing asylum claims — this time basing that refusal on assertions that migrants carry other infectious diseases like tuberculosis. Credit... Doug Mills/The New York Times

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By Charlie Savage Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan

• Nov. 11, 2023

Former President Donald J. Trump is planning an extreme expansion of his first-term crackdown on immigration if he returns to power in 2025 — including preparing to round up undocumented people already in the United States on a vast scale and detain them in sprawling camps while they wait to be expelled.

The plans would sharply restrict both legal and illegal immigration in a multitude of ways.

Mr. Trump wants to revive his first-term border policies, including banning entry by people from certain Muslim-majority nations and reimposing a Covid 19-era policy of refusing asylum claims — though this time he would base that refusal on assertions that migrants carry other infectious diseases like tuberculosis.

He plans to scour the country for unauthorized immigrants and deport people by the millions per year.

To help speed mass deportations, Mr. Trump is preparing an enormous expansion of a form of removal that does not require due process hearings. To help Immigration and Customs Enforcement carry out sweeping raids, he plans to reassign other federal agents and deputize local police officers and National Guard soldiers voluntarily contributed by Republican-run states.

To ease the strain on ICE detention facilities, Mr. Trump wants to build huge camps to detain people while their cases are processed and they await deportation flights. And to get around any refusal by Congress to appropriate the necessary funds, Mr. Trump would redirect money in the military budget, as he did in his first term to spend more on a border wall than Congress had authorized.

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