EDITORIAL - The Sinulog must not ease Santo Niño into insignificance

Clarifications are not only in order but clarifications should come not just from one source but from every Cebuano who is in the know and who knows what is right and just. And the clarifications that need to be made concern the difference between Fiesta Señor and Sinulog.

The Fiesta Señor is the Feast of the Santo Niño, the Holy child to whose devotion only sprung the Sinulog, initially a dance, and later a cultural festival highlighted by the now world famous tourist attraction of the same name.

Although both are closely interrelated, they should never be confused with one another. The Feast of the Santo Niño is a religious activity while the Sinulog, while rooted in an act of devotion and homage, has evolved into a cultural and highly-commercialized activity.

Many are aghast that the two are being confused with one another even by Cebuanos, especially by officials and members of the media, who should know better. If the Cebuanos themselves cannot make the distinction, the outsiders and visitors never will.

For example, all too often the solemn procession in honor of the Santo Niño, which is held on the Saturday before the Feast Day, which falls on the third Sunday of January, is being referred to as the Sinulog procession. That's right. And that is wrong.

It is blasphemous to call the Santo Niño procession as the Sinulog procession. But that is precisely what everybody did. Check yesterday's papers. The Santo Niño procession is the Santo Niño procession, in honor of God as the Holy Child, not in honor of the festival.

More importantly, the third Sunday of January should be known more as the Feast of the Santo Niño, not the day of the Sinulog parade. Let us not lose sight of the fact that the religious significance is supreme than the cultural revelry that falls on the same day.

Without the Feast Day of the Santo Niño, there would have been no Sinulog. So we make this appeal to all, from officials to the media to the ordinary Cebuanos -- let us not confuse God and his feast day with the merry-making that happens on that day.

Let us not overuse the word Sinulog to mean everything associated with the Santo Niño because that is wrong. Right now there is already an overkill, a surfeit of Sinulog parades, in the city and elsewhere. Let us not ease out God to insignificance.