This ritual in the Philippines originated from Europe, where it was a widespread, but often marginalized form of penance for sins carried out by Catholics. Several ‘flagellant’ movements were in fact condemned by the Church hierarchy at times in history. These movements often went underground. In Southern France, Italy, and Spain, self-flagellation survived as more of a mainstream practice. As the Philippines were colonized by the Spanish, self-flagellation was introduced to the archipelago as more of a mainstream practice than one of the Catholic fringe (Zialcita 1986).

          Within 30 years of the Spanish arrival in the Philippines, “self-flagellation was already and established mass phenomenon” (Braunlein 2014, 67). While, Braunlein states that acceptance of the practice was “surprising, because religious self-mortification was unknown in pre-Spanish Philippines”, there are indigenous precursors to the practice – as it is understood and utilized by Filipinos (Braunlein 2014, 67). Zialcita states that what was an official practice approved of by the Church hierarchy “became folk when the people took the practice from under the priests’ supervision into the countryside and gave it a different form and meaning” (Zialcita 1986, 56).

          In Catholic tradition, sin is forgiven through the sacrament of confession, but “penitential acts were needed to remove the effects of the sin” and keep “the sinner from relapsing into sin” (Zialcita 1986, 56). One of many forms of penance that can be performed is self- mortification – including the act of self- flagellation. In the Philippines, not only do concepts of what constitutes sin differ from those of the Church hierarchy, but sin is not in fact the focus of self-flagellants – and the more recent voluntarily crucified ‘Kristos’.