All the fear of the mysterious as well as the belief of the Filipinos
in unseen powers which took away life, attracted misfortunes, gave
victory, or conduced to disaster was conserved, changing only the
concepts that they had about the spirits that governed the affairs
of life and the phenomena of nature. The patron saints recommended
by the missionaries came to take the place of the ancient anitos
representative of their past which they gave intervention in their
idolatry in all the affairs of life.
When the missionaries preached their religion, they condemned the old
Pagan superstitions but they taught new superstitions more powerful
than the original, not only because of the prestige of the new patrons
who are all members of a Celestial Court organized as an earthly
aristocracy and headed by the same God, Creator of the Universe,
but by communicating with God in the same tongue, which the ordinary
man supposed was spoken by Him, which is the Latin tongue, in which
the priests said their prayers and sang their hymns.
"Ensalmos"
The Oremus, the Laus Deo, Agnus Dei, Deo Gracias, Nos cum prole pia,
Benedicat Virgo Maria, Per omnia secula seculorum, Kyrie eleyson,
Christe eleyson, came under the category of enchantments (ensalmos)
known by the terms bolong and mantala of the primitive mangkukulam,
manghihikup, mananangisama, etc. etc., of Philippine paganism. All
of these Latin phrases acquired so great a prestige that they were
looked upon as a form of irresistible invocation for conquering the
divine will, and a certain ridiculous sect came to be known as the
Colorum, which term originated from the wrong pronunciation of secula
seculorum with which many Latin prayers ended, prayers which were
incomprehensible but used due to the ignorance of many.
The phrase agnus dei qui tolis pecata mundi is used as an incantation
in which every word more or less incomprehensible has a sacred
character so that if one should say that he despises qui tolis, it
would be considered a blasphemy because the Qui Tolis is something
sacred or divine. A child after saying the trisagio said by way of
protest: "I am tired of saying kirileson (Kyrie eleyson)." His mother
then punished him for playing with the name of God. Another child who
happened to name a dog Qui Tolis was corrected by his aunt, saying:
"The name of God is never used for naming an animal."