FINALIST 30th NATIONAL BOOK AWARDS

Beautiful, richly illustrated with color photographs.

LA CASA DE DIOS : The Legacy of Filipino-Hispanic Churches began as a personal project of Rafael Ortigas Jr., whose love for the Spanish heritage of the Philippines moved him to have the chures of the colonial era documented photographically. Mr Oritas' dream was to catalogue all the churches in the Philippines, not just as a tstament to Spanish heritage, of which he was duly proud, but more important, not just as a testament to Spanish heritage, of which he was duly proud, but more importantly as a witness to the teachings of the Catholic Church, the Church close to his own heart.

The photo project went on for over 12 years up to his death in 2009, when it was still not finished. This was an ambitious project, no doubt and posed challenges all its own. A complete catalogue would have to first identify how many churches were built during the Spanish colonial era, and what would constitute inclusion because there are many types of churches, and what would be considered colonial era if the structure was no longer in its original form.

The question of quantity was a problem. Do you count all the churches built on the same spot, more or less? The Manila Cathedral, according to official count was rebuilt eight times but even more than that if major renovations are counted. How do you handle churches built over a long period of time? Or those that have been renovated? In Bohol for instance, many pre-exisiting churches had Classical-type porticoes added in the 19th century such as those of Loboc, Baclayong and Dauis. There is the question of time. Would Dauis, with its Grecian-type facade, be counted as Spanish colonial, when the facade was completed only in 1926? Or should Molo's or Maribojoc's altars be counted when they were finisished in the 1920's? And finally how do you handle a church complex? Many churches were not meant to stand alone. So - from Amzon