The Roman Catholic Church will commemorate the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception on Thursday, Dec. 8.
At the Immaculate Conception Parish in Tayuman, Tondo, Manila, holy masses will be celebrated starting at 5:30 a.m. until 7:30 p.m. The Misa Mayor (High Mass) will be celebrated at 6 p.m. It will be preceded by the praying of the Holy Rosary at 5:30 p.m. A solemn procession will be held at 7 p.m.
Novena masses were offered from Nov. 29 to Dec. 7. A grand Marian procession will be held on Wednesday, Dec. 7, after the 6 p.m. mass. This year’s feast of the Immaculate Conception coincides with the 71st parish fiesta.
Meanwhile, in Catholic churches and Marian shrines across the country, devotees are expected to attend the special commemorative masses in honor of the Principal Patroness of the Philippines – the Immaculate Conception on Thursday, which is considered a holy day of obligation and observed as a non-working holiday in the Philippines.
Novenas, special devotions, candle offerings, and the recitation of the holy rosary will also be observed.
The observance of the Feast of the Immaculate Conception celebrates the Roman Catholic dogma, “Ineffabilis Deus,” as defined by Pope Pius IX on Dec. 8, 1854, which affirmed the belief that the Blessed Virgin Mary, “in the first instance of her conception, was, by a unique grace and privilege by the Almighty God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of original sin.”
According to Church officials, “The universal redemption of Jesus was anticipated for Mary at the time of her conception by her mother, Saint Anne, in view of her divine motherhood. Mary’s Immaculate Conception enhances Jesus’ redemptive work. While humans are cleansed from original sin through baptism, in Mary, Jesus’ work was so powerful as to prevent original sin at the onset.”
In the year 1858, during the Blessed Mother’s apparition in Lourdes, France, she introduced herself as the Immaculate Conception to St. Bernadette.