Thursday, December 25, 2008 UB marks significant holiday traditions By Roland Rabang
MORE legend than fact, but the story remains heartwarming.
One Christmas day in 1863 in the Church of Saint Nicholas in an Austrian town, parishioners discovered that their pipe organ's bellows were devastated by rats. As a result, not even a whimper could come out of the church's precious musical instrument.
Faced with the unimaginable scenario of holding Christmas services with the congregation without music, parish priest Joseph Mohr and school headmaster Franz Gruber resolved to write a song that would be alternatively accompanied by a guitar.
Thus, the now immortal Christmas carol Silent Night was born. More than a hundred years later, the Christian world still sings the song from the heart every Christmas time.
Christmas carols provide the atmosphere of the holidays. We do not need the legend of Silent Night to prove that. All we have to do is step inside a mall.
But to soak up in the solemn spirit of advent, one needs to attend an event called a "cantata."
Here, the story of the birth of Jesus inspired by the gospel is told through a chorus of musical voices that in the end, the audience is convinced Christmas is indeed about a Man born to redeem the sins of the world.
More fact than legend, the story goes that nearly forty years ago, University of Baguio (UB) founders Dr. and Mrs. Fernando G. Bautista were thinking of ways to make the students of the University look beyond the materialism of the holidays. The founders' idea was processed by another UB think-tank Emmett Brown Asuncion, and the first ever UB cantata took place in December 1970. Every year since 1970, the university holds this concert that musters the collective voices of some two thousand students that would make you believe a Messiah is indeed born modest but with a grand mission for humankind.
While a "cantata" is common and may be held in any part of the City during the holidays, the UB tradition is rooted in the participation of its students in numbers that would fill the rafters and bleachers of its gym with singing voices.
One can thus imagine being seated in the audience's gallery and getting surrounded with Christmas airs that combines classical Latin hymns such as "Laudate," "Rorate" and "Dominus Dixit Ad Me," with the more contemporary and familiar carols such as "O Little Town of Bethlehem," "O Come All Ye Faithful," and "Hark the Herald Angels Sing."
The list is sequenced in a religious service that begins with a Mass and a Nativity tableau. The sequence, for instance, of the tableau from the Betrothal to the Wise Men's visit is narrated through songs and capped by the participation of the community in the singing of "Joy to the World."
One did not have to imagine the event however, as UB had invited the public to witness the "Cantate Domino" in three schedules and venues: at the UB Gym on December 18 and 19, and at the Baguio Cathedral on December 20.
Meanwhile, an all UB family affair on Saturday called "Know Your Brood" added dimension to the UB founder's moniker "Tatay," as UB personnel, teaching and non-teaching, together with their families gathered in one place for a day of fellowship and gift-giving.
With a day held for fun and games as well as breaking bread at the table, University personnel as the founders' extended family honored another holiday tradition established by the late patriarch that continues to this day by his descendants.
Former University president Virgilio Bautista said the joy and gratification brought about by the smiles and laughter of children is enough to continue with the tradition regardless of economic conditions. "The bright smiles and loving eyes of the children is enough gratification to continue with this traditional affair," he said.
