| Santo Niño de Tondo | |
| Size: | 270px |
| Location: | Tondo, Manila, Philippines |
| Date: | 1572 |
| Witness: | Miguel López de Legazpi |
| Type: | Statue made with Ivory head, hands, and feet with a Wooden body |
| Approval: | Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Manila (formerly Diocese of Manila) |
| Venerated In: | Catholic Church |
| Shrine: | Archdiocesan Shrine of Santo Niño de Tondo |
| Attributes: | crown, sceptre, globus cruciger, light skin, maroon mantle, gold boots |
| Feast Day: | Third Sunday in January |
| Patronage: | Tondo, Manila |
The Santo Niño de Tondo is a Catholic title of the Child Jesus associated with a religious image of the Christ Child.[1] The image was brought to the Philippines during the expedition of Miguel López de Legazpi in 1572 and is the 2nd oldest image of the Child Jesus in the Philippines, after the Santo Niño de Cebú. The image is enshrined in the Archdiocesan Shrine of Santo Niño de Tondo.
The statue of the Infant Jesus was originally brought to Manila from Acapulco in the early 1570s.[2] This was likely during the expedition of Miguel López de Legazpi. The shrine of the Holy Child was recognized as a Provincial Chapter by the Spanish Augustinian friars of Luzon on May 3, 1572, with its parish priest, Fray. Alonzo Alvarado, OSA, becoming the official parish priest and director of the church of Tondo, Manila. [3]
The image of Santo Niño de Tondo was taken from its shrine on July 14, 1972. Fr. Lorenzo Egos, the then-assistant parish priest, had claimed that the robbers fled the church after the doors were locked at 8 p.m, that day.
Coincidentally, after the image was stolen, the country was struck by one of the worst weather-related natural disasters in Philippine history, Typhoon Gloring. A majority of the Filipino faithful believed that the disaster was caused by the theft of the image.
Sometime after the theft, authorities had captured the four men responsible for stealing the image. When the image was found, it was dismembered. The main body was discarded in a nearby canal, while the head, hands, and feet were found in the possession of other robbers. All parts of the image were, nonetheless, recovered.
Former Philippine president Ferdinand Marcos ordered the urgent reconstruction of the desecrated image, which was handed to sculptor Máximo Vicente.
The Santo Niño de Tondo is considered the second-oldest venerated image of the Child Jesus in the country, next to the Santo Niño de Cebu. On February 5, 2019, the Parish of Santo Nino de Tondo was elevated as an Archdiocesan Shrine. Under this decree, the Archdiocese of Manila recognizes the spiritual, historical, and cultural importance of the shrine and the devotion to the Santo Niño de Tondo within and outside the archdiocese. Filipinos regard the image as miraculous. Replicas of the original image can be found in Filipino homes, households, and business establishments.[4] Devotees of the Christ Child often refer to Him as Hari ng Tondo, which translates to the "King of Tondo".[5]
The feast day of Sto. Niño in Tondo is celebrated in the third Sunday of January. The fiesta in Tondo has the biggest participation in Manila, not only because Tondo is the most populous district in the city and poorest but perhaps because of the many anecdotes connected with the Sto. Niño of Tondo.
According to the Philippine Historical Commission, the people of Tondo celebrated the feast day with a fluvial procession that "attracted thousands of visitors." Tondo's terrain at that time consisted of waterways and tributaries which were connected to Manila Bay, a probable reason why the present stone church of Tondo was constructed on elevated ground (several meters above sea level) to prevent sea waters from inundating the Church.
Nick Joaquin writes, "historically, the devotion to Santo Niño (in general) outranks all others because the first church in the Philippines was built to enshrine an image of the Santo Niño".[6] In his book entitled Almanac for Manileños (Published in 1979), Joaquin describes the previous celebrations of the fiesta:
The fiesta of the Santo Niño has since been called the "Labayaw Festival". The name of the festival is a portmanteau of the Tagalog-Filipino words Lakbay (meaning "to journey") and Sayaw (meaning "to dance"). It essentially means "a joyful journey with the Lord".