Two future saints served in Dagupan
TRIVIA FOR 400th JUBILLE CELEBRATION
DID you know that Dagupan has two candidates for sainthood who are now recognized as among the icons of the Catholic Church?
The enlarged black and white photographs of the two have been posted conspicuously inside the St. John Metropolitan Cathedral since November 30, a week after the start of the 400th jubilee celebration of Dagupan as a parish on November 22.
Church records traced the parish’s humble beginning in 1614.
The attention of the faithful who gathered in the cathedral for the Sunday mass was called to the two men in the portraits when the priest who read the homily written by Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas entitled “We have seen a great light!” and pointed to the men.
The two are Blessed (Beato) Jose Garcia Diaz and Blessed Candido Fernandez Garcia who both served Dagupan parish as pastors. They were martyred in Barcelona where they were reassigned to continue their ministry during the Spanish Civil War persecution.
They ministered in Dagupan as teachers in the Colegio de San Alberto Magno, the first sectarian school in Dagupan then located in Calmay when it was still connected with mainland Dagupan by a bridge that spanned across the Calmay River.
Archbishjop Villegas in his homily referred to the two as ” the blessed among us,” said “both did not use fishing nets to catch fish but instead used their golden tongues and sterling lives to win souls for the Lord.”
The four hundredth year of Dagupan with John the Evangelist as the patron saint “beckons us to follow the path of the saints because indeed that is who we are,” said the archbishop in that homily.
BAGNOTAN PARISH
Dagupan was still known as Bagnotan when the parish was established by the Dominican friars.
However, historical records showed it was the Agustianian friars who planted the first cross in Bagnotan when they made it as a “visita” in 1590. In 1613, the Augustinians passed on the spiritual care of Bagnotan to the Dominicans who formally accepted it as a “domus” in the Dominican Chapter of 1614 under the patronage of Saint John the Evangelist.
There was no account of the patronage of Bagnotan in 1590 when it was still a “visita” under the Agustinians. It was only in the Dominican chapter of 1614 that the name San Juan Evangelista de Bagnotan appeared for the first time.
As a domus in 1614, Bagnotan was attached to the bigger church in Calasiao. From being a simple domus of the Dominican Fathers in 1614, Bagnotan metamorphosed to become Dagupan, the melting pot of Pangasinan and a city in 1947.
HOMILY
The homily of Archbishop Villegas recounts the historic events that Dagupan went through in its 400- year struggle when it said:: “Washed away by floods and shaken by earthquakes; burned by revolutionaries and razed by war, Dagupan stands like a living proof of the fidelity of the Lord who promised His people”.
In that homily, the Archbishop said, although Dagupan through the years has become the hub of business and industry in Pangasinan, “our city is still known by our Dagupan bangus and our best industry is still fishing”. As a fishing community, “we are called like Saint John our patron to follow Him, no longer by abandoning our nets but this time by using our nets to become saints.”
He continued: “We can become saints like John the fisherman by keeping our rivers clean and free from pollution as responsible stewards of God’s creation. Saint John is not just a patron who prays for us; he is also a model.”
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