Batangas | Our Lady Of Caysasay

Batangas | Our Lady Of Caysasay
A Venerated Church And The Girls Who Chased After Us

After visiting a lot of "Bahay na Bato" in the Heritage town of Taal and the Minor Basilica, I thought were done with churches. It's the time of the afternoon where you can go out; the sun's heat has already subsided. Thought we would already have much about the history of Taal in a day, but it's not enough really. Seeing that the whole town itself is littered with old heritage houses, the new ones obviously built from the old foundations. I have to say that visiting the Church of Our Lady of Caysasay is my least favorite, but still it's a venerated church for a good reason.

The church of Our Lady of Caysasay as viewed from the outside.

Home of the Queen of Archdiocese of Lipa, the Our Lady of Caysasay is a Marian statue depicting the image of the Immaculate Conception. It has a long history going back to the early days of the town, as of today the Our Lady of Caysasay is a venerated church. I have no idea about this church prior to my stepping into its threshold, or the holy well of Santa Lucia, where it is famous for devout Catholics I've only realized it while making this post.

The church interiors, with the painted window reliefs to frame it and the patterns painted in the ceiling.

On this trip, I was with a rowdy group of guys into blogging or just being a travel enthusiast. We were all getting good, being first time visitors of Taal heritage town. At our arrival in this small church, we were approach by little girls offering candles. It seems that none of us were really devout Catholics, and to be honest we were mostly interested with the history of the church, the mural and its architecture. It was really hard to fend off these pimping girls, as they started fighting each other as to who offered the first candles or that they are very insistent on us buying candles from them when we just kept mum, as we do not really intend to light a candle.

Adobe walls make up the entire church.

The church has Adobe walls, there are some amateurish wall paintings depicting the discovery of the Statue of Our Lady of Caysasay from Pansipit River by Juan Maningcad. What caught my attention is the murals off the ceilings, and since there is absence of details and reliefs of the corners or windows, in them were painted patterns instead. It gives a nice warm hue all over and an oriental vibe for the designs, while the murals off the ceilings are stunning holy images of Christ's Ascension. The altar is grand with images of the venerated statue.

This is the painting in the wall depicting the discovery of the Marian Statue of Our Lady of Caysasay by Juan Maningcad.

This is the mural paintings seen from the circular ceiling depicting images of Christ Ascension to heaven.

We exited at the side of the church towards it's back to visit the Holy Well of Santa Lucia. We were hoping that the girls had given up offering candles, but we were surprise to find them waiting for us. What's more, they came with us all the way to the well trying to talk our ears off.

We noticed along the way that there are a lot of houses built beside the water spring, and as we know, residential houses beside water sources normally means garbage's thrown in them, and we weren't surprise, the famous site of old Pansipit river is now a polluted small water stream. Along the way, people tried to accompany us, even finding the person who would fetch us water off the well. We didn't think we would have to dip our hands in these waters, holy and miraculous they might be.

I was curious enough so I took a closer look at the water source, it is clear, thank God, but I saw frogs living in it, so I didn't dare dip my hands in them. I decided to just light a candle and say a little prayer from the image of the Immaculate Conception that was placed beside the well, my companions  most of them I realized where probably not Catholics, so they contented themselves in just observing the tableau.

This is the arch marking the place of the Holy Well of Santa Lucia.

And here are some of the girls who accompanied us in our visit to the well.

Francis Balgos is a Call Center Agent, Weekend Travel Warrior, Amateur Spelunker, Sometime Surfer, Newbie Mountain Climber, Photography Enthusiast, Certified Beach Bum, A first born son, Faithful lover, True Explorer...

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