Today, the City of San Pedro Tunasán, our adoptive city for the past 16 years, celebrates the feast day of the Chair of Saint Peter, its namesake saint. February 22 is also the date when our city usually celebrates the Sampaguita Festival, a week-long festivity that aims to promote tourism as well as to revitalize the dying sampaguita industry. But this year, there is no Sampaguita Festival due to the coronavirus scare (a precautionary directive from the Department of Interior and Local Government).
A few years ago, I heard from the grapevine that there were plans to move the Sampaguita Festival on May 3, the original town fiesta of San Pedro Tunasán. May 3 is the traditional feast day of The Exaltation of the Holy Cross (now celebrated every September 14). The Vicariate of San Pedro Apóstol, to which our parish belongs, and our local government unit headed by Mayor Lourdes S. Catáquiz, decided to bring back the original feast day of May 3. I was told that (if I remember correctly) the town fiesta was transferred from May 3 to February 22 during the 1960s. When the Sampaguita Festival was launched in 2003, its organizers decided to coincide it with the feast of the Chair of Saint Peter. This year, the Sampaguita Festival will now be celebrated together with the city’s original feast day.
The decision to return our city’s traditional feast day from February 22 to May 3 is a good move as it a sign of reverence toward religious history. While it is true that The Exaltation of the Holy Cross has nothing to do with our city’s name, as it is usually the practice of many Filipino towns and cities named after saints to celebrate their fiestas after their respective namesake saints’ feast days, it should be noted that San Pedro Tunasán is the home of one of our province’s most famous icons: the Cross of Tunasán. It was mentioned by no less than José Rizal in his Noli Me Tangere.
Now that we have cleared that up, let us now clarify another confusion regarding today’s liturgical feast day. For centuries, the Chair of Saint Peter was celebrated twice a year: first on the 18th of January and second on the 22nd of February. However, these two feasts differ from each other. The January feast day commemorates the day when Saint Peter the Apostle evangelized in Rome, Italy while the February version pertained to his evangelization in Antioch, Greece. Sometime in 1960, for reasons I could not comprehend, Pope John XXIII removed the January 18 celebration, making February 22 the only feast day for the Chair of Saint Peter the Apostle. With all due respect to the Vatican, this should not have been done because the fact will always remain that the January 18 feast day pertained to the “Chair of Saint Peter at Rome” and the February 22 feast day pertained to the “Chair of Saint Peter at Antioch”.
One should also take note that San Pedro Tunasán was founded on 18 January 1725, exactly on the feast day of the Chair of Saint Peter in Rome. Besides, all images of Saint Peter the Apostle inside the Church of San Pedro Apóstol are attributed to his papacy in Rome, not in Antioch. And whenever one talks about Saint Peter’s papacy, Rome always comes to mind, not Antioch. In our province, the local government of the City of San Pedro Tunasán based its 18-year-old Sampaguita Festival on the February 22nd feast day. I hope that one day, our church leaders will put back the original feast day as it is heavily intertwined with San Pedro Tunasán’s history.
Image of Saint Peter seated on his throne as the first Pope of the Roman Catholic Church.
EL FILIPINISMO 