The annual Feast of Our Lady of the Most Holy Rosary of La Naval brought centuries-old Marian devotion into focus on Sunday, October 11, with this year’s celebration in Quezon City carrying a call for peace, justice, and solidarity with the vulnerable.
The feast, held under the theme “Mary, Queen and Mother of Peace”, culminated in the traditional grand procession of the revered ivory-and-wood image through the streets surrounding Santo Domingo Church. More than 300,000 devotees took part in the celebration, one of the Philippines’ most significant Marian observances.
The procession remains the centerpiece of the annual celebration, bringing together devotees who see the image not only as a symbol of Marian devotion but also as a link to a tradition that has endured for centuries. This year, that tradition was framed around a broader call for peace and justice.
At Mass before the procession, Cubao Bishop Elias Ayuban Jr. urged Catholics to look beyond prayer and turn their devotion into action, particularly by helping people facing poverty and homelessness.
“We pray for peace, but at the same time should work for justice,” Ayuban said in his homily, stressing that peace does not mean the absence of problems but the assurance of God’s presence amid difficulties.
“It is a peace rooted in God’s presence, a peace that enables us to face difficulties without surrendering to hatred, fear, or despair,” he said.
His message added a social dimension to the celebration, connecting the religious observance with the challenges faced by communities beyond the church. For Ayuban, the pursuit of peace also requires Catholics to examine how they respond to disagreement and difference.
Ayuban, who also serves as apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Parañaque, said peace begins with the willingness to listen, warning that disagreements can worsen when people become more concerned with proving themselves right than understanding others.
“Ang kapayapaan ay nagsisimula sa pusong marunong makinig,” he said.
The bishop also encouraged families to pray the rosary together, recalling how he regularly prayed with his mother, who died in November last year. He remembered one of her final reminders: “Anak, mamayang gabi magdasal ka na ng rosaryo.”
“The mission of our mothers does not have any expiration,” Ayuban said, comparing his mother’s enduring influence with Mary’s maternal care for the faithful.
For Ayuban, the personal memory also reflected the wider role of Marian devotion in Catholic family life, where prayer is often passed from one generation to another. His recollection gave a personal dimension to a celebration rooted in a much longer religious tradition.
Ayuban, who had presided over two other Marian celebrations earlier that day, said he had made a point of joining the entire La Naval procession after leaving early during the previous year because of another engagement. He invoked the traditional description of the event as la procesión de las procesiones, or the procession of all processions.
At the conclusion of Sunday’s procession, Ayuban led the Act of Consecration to Our Lady of La Naval, entrusting devotees to Mary’s protection and intercession.
The image dates to 1593, when Spanish governor-general Luis Pérez Dasmariñas commissioned an unnamed Chinese sculptor to create the Virgin Mary and Child Jesus. Carved from ivory and wood, it was entrusted to Dominican friars at Santo Domingo Church in Intramuros, Manila.
The feast commemorates the 1646 naval victories of Filipino and Spanish forces over Dutch fleets, victories that Catholic tradition attributes to the intercession of the Virgin of the Rosary. The image was canonically crowned in 1907 and later transferred to the present Santo Domingo Church in Quezon City after the original Intramuros shrine was destroyed during World War II.
The history of the image and the feast has helped make La Naval one of the Philippines’ enduring expressions of Marian devotion. Its annual observance combines religious ritual, public procession, and collective remembrance, linking contemporary devotees with generations of Catholics who have gathered to honor the Virgin of the Rosary.
The Quezon City Council declared Our Lady of La Naval the city’s patroness in 1973, a designation affirmed by Pope Paul VI the following year.
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