04/09/2025
From an exfoliating calendar sheet, we translate: Arrival in Taytay and first mass there by Father Pedro Chirino, the first Jesuit who spoke Tagalog and founded a town here.
The town of Taytay then belonged to the encomienda of the Spanish named Luis Enriquez in merit of having subdued Masbate. It was administered by the Franciscan priests who had to abandon it to attend to other more extensive work.
P Chirino came to the Philippines with Governor Dasmarinas in 1589. He learned the Tagalog language in Balayan and after three months, he was considered capable of taking charge of the mission in Taytay and Antipolo. Father Pastels noting the evangelical works of Collin brings these details of the trip. Father Chirino left Manila (as he himself recounts) with his old companion, Brother Francisco Martin, on Saturday morning, the day of the Glorious San Ildefonso, Archbishop of Toledo, in fifteen ninety-three. They went up the river in a small vessel and, saying Mass on the way at the convent of Pasig, they went to eat and rest on one of the islands of the lagoon; from there, with the calm of the dawn, the next day, Sunday, they crossed to Tabuc, which is on the shore of the lagoon on the border side of Taytay, entrusted to Don Luys Henriquez, who pacified Masbate. He jumped ashore at a good time and at a very good juncture to say mass to the people and some Spaniards who were in the house where they did not hear it because the priest was in a state of distress.
Originally, the town was in a flooded area on the banks of the Bay Lagoon. Let's see how the missionary himself describes it:
At this time, the town of Taytay was very much at the water's edge of a creek or stream that comes from the springs of Antipolo and drains into the river next to the same lagoon and the mountains; so low that every year, when the lagoon spills over with the floods of the many rivers that flow into it, it bathes and floods it, like the Nile does to the land of Egypt, and it remains flooded like this from August until October or November. So that during this time the whole valley is a lagoon of a state and deeper, and it cannot be traversed except by boats.
Later it adds: This flood not only drowned the village so that one could not walk the streets except by boat, as I did many times, but even having raised the floor of the church and having made repairs for the water, it entered and rose all the way to the high altar. Therefore, they had a small hill marked nearby, where those who died at this time were buried. And for the mass, they would go to Antipolo, in those mountains. The first time I saw the church flooded, and it could not hold mass, I believed what I had not been able to fully believe even though I had been told many times.
There were then about 400 families in Taytay divided into four barangays with a leader at the front of each one. Father Chirino, to remedy that situation and obtain the relocation of the town, devised it this way:
I called my four Datus - he says - and from the choir I showed them the altar. Where they saw (they already knew from before) that mass could not be said. And without saying it (I told them) though unworthy, every day, I cannot live, because she is my sustenance that gives me strength to serve you for Christ. So I will have to go later, where I can say it, which is Antipolo. If you want to see me again, you will make me a small church on the little hill, where the deceased are now buried, where I will say mass with a little resting place to gather; and until this is done, may God be with you, and I left.
So, it was done. 'They,' adds the father, 'with the desire for my return, then began their work, and they finished it, so that I could be there and say Mass and even serve as their bait, after which they began to pass over slowly, as it was necessary to dismantle the church and take its materials there, along with the cross from the cemetery. Then they hurried so much to move to the new village that ten or twelve would cram into one house while each was building their own. I was astonished at so much haste, and when I asked the reason, they told me that they suffered from night terrors of demons in the old village for being already without church and cross, and thus no one dared to sleep there.
In this way, the town of Taytay was relocated, improving its location.
