May 17 -- Feast of Saint Paschal Baylon

Paschal in the kitchen -- buy it here

A three-day fertility festival begins today in Obando, Bulacan (Philippines).  Celebrants are generally hoping for sons and daughters, though some supplicants are asking for husbands and wives.  Some even just ask for prosperity.  The festival begins with a Mass, but then three religious statues -- Saint Paschal, Saint Clare, and Our Lady of Salambao -- are carried through the streets in a parade.  Participants sing and dance to music that is played on bamboo instruments. 

The festival seems to have started because Saint Paschal's surname -- Baylon -- sounds like a derivative of bailar, the Spanish verb for dance.  Dancing for fertility was reinforced by a childless couple in the area who were advised by an old crab seller to go to Obando and celebrate the feast day by dancing.  When they arrived in the town and saw the statue of the saint, they recognized his face as that of the crab seller.  I hope they named their first-born Paschal, but that's not recorded in the version I read. 

One of St. Clare's feasts is May 18, the second day of the festival (though she's celebrated here on September 23).  A song entitled "Santa Clara Pinung-Pino" is sung to her.  It probably loses something in translation. 

To the very refined, Saint Claire
This is my promise
Upon reaching Obando Town
I will dance the fandango.

To the very refined, Saint Claire
I pray that you grant me
Thirteen spouses all in all
To the costs, I won’t complain at all!

Fertility Festival Fever -- Catch it!

The San Pascual de Baylon Parish Church was badly damaged during World War II, which interrupted the annual festival.  Shortly after, the traditional celebration was banned by the Archbishop of Manila.  He was evidently uncomfortable with the syncretic origin -- dancing for fertility and parading sculptures for veneration probably seemed a little too pagan for him.  However, Father Rome R. Fernandez brought the festival back in 1972 and it continues to this day. 

As for Saint Paschal Baylon himself, he's a model of humility and a patron of cooks and kitchens.  A sixteenth century Spanish shepherd, he was struggling to learn how to read while his fellow shepherds were drinking, gambling, and living it up.  At age 24, he became a lay brother in a Franciscan monastery, working as a doorkeeper and cook.  His strict piety was rewarded by ecstatic visions.  In spite of these miraculous revelations, he remained exceptionally humble; paradoxically, his reputation was enhanced and the High & Mighty visited the monastery to seek his counsel. 

A band took the saint's name -- rock on, Bone Daddy. 

Paschal Baylon died in 1592 and was beatified in 1618.  In 1650, an indigenous Guatemalan was dying of fever.  After he received last rites, the Guatemalan was visited by a vision of a skeleton in robes who introduced himself as Saint Paschal Baylon.  The bony apparition told the man that the local epidemic would be ended if the town would adopt Saint Paschal as its patron.  As proof, he told the man he would survive long enough to offer this testimony, but would then relapse and die in nine days.  Both the death and the end of the plague came to pass.  Thus, even though he wasn't formally a saint, and even though the Spanish Inquisition tried to step on the veneration of this unapproved saint, Paschal became the King of the Graveyard, celebrated throughout Guatemala and Chiapas (Mexico).  Offerings, especially candles and capes, are made to him.  Below is a color-coded list of candles in case you want to participate. 

Red: love                                     Purple: help against vices
Pink: health                                 White: protection of children
Yellow: protection                       Green:  business
Blue: work                                   Light blue: money
Black: revenge