Feast of the Black Nazarene

The Feast of the Black Nazarene is a religious festival celebrated each year in the Philippines on the 9th of January for an event called the Traslación. The ceremony is performed during which an image of the Black Nazarene dating from the 16th century is carried by devotees on their shoulders along the streets of Quiapo, Manila.

The Feast of the Black Nazarene marks the traditional Feast of the Most Holy Name of Jesus (the original dedication of Quiapo Church), celebrated by an annual procession of the image of the Nazarene along the streets of Quiapo, Manila.^[1]

Despite no document to confirm its exact date, the devotional Traslación is told to have began in January of 1787 when the Nazarene's image was delivered to Quiapo Church from Spain.

Obscurity notwithstanding, the 9th of January is considered today by the Archdiocese of Manila as the image's national liturgical feast day since 2025 from a request granted by the Holy See.^[2][3]

• Similar processions replicating the Traslación in Quiapo, Manila are held in other parts of the Philippines. The largest of these is in the city of Cagayan de Oro in Mindanao with a replica of the Black Nazarene image given by the Quiapo Church) in 2009. It has become a focal point for Roman Catholic devotion in Mindanao.^[4]

• A replica of the Black Nazarene arrived at the Old Chapel of St. Rock the Healer Mission Center in Catarman, Northern Samar on March 4, 2014. On January 9, 2015, the first Traslación was held when the sacred image was carried on shoulders from the chapel to a church consecrated by Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle.^[5]