MANILA - Manila Archbishop Luis Antonio Cardinal Tagle on Saturday said people should not judge the extreme piety of thousands of devotees who trooped to the Feast of the Black Nazarene.

In his homily during a Mass held a few hours before the annual Black Nazarene procession on Saturday, the cardinal said this burning and fervent devotion is the devotee’s expression of faith, love and thanksgiving.

“For the others who think the devotees are just shoving each other. That is not true!” Tagle said in a CBCP News report.

“Have you ever experienced having nothing more to hold on to? Once you’ve experienced that, then the Nazareno is there for you. Go to him. Hold on to him. You will understand why the devotees just want to get near Him. You don’t have anyone to hold on to, but the Nazarene is there,” he said.

Tagle noted devotees waited for more than seven hours for the traditional “Pahalik” at the Quirino Grandstand, enduring hunger, thirst and the heat just to get a few seconds to touch the revered image.

“Why do you sacrifice every year? Getting less sleep, getting hungry at time? Others get injured. Others faint because of the heat. But why do you keep doing it? The common answer is, ‘This is my way of showing my gratitude. I want to thank the ‘Poong Nazareno’ because of his undying and unfathomable faithfulness at goodness to me,’” he said.

The prelate said the Catholic faithful who join the procession just want to give thanks to God "who gave a lot for all of us."

He also reminded the public of the upcoming 51st International Eucharistic Congress (IEC) which the country is hosting in Cebu on Jan. 24 to 31.

He said Nazareno devotees might not be able to get near the image of the Black Nazarene, but they must look to the Eucharist as the "fulfillment of their devotion."

"In the Eucharist we see the works of Jesus which we need to follow," Tagle said.

Meanwhile, former Minor Basilica of the Black Nazarene rector Msgr. Jose Clemente Ignacio backed the cardinal. "It is only God who could see through the hearts of these peoples," he said.

“I hope, before we make easy judgments about devotions, we must fully understand why people express their faith the way they do. Popular piety involves the whole person, not just the mind. It might me a mystical experience even which we do not understand. We only need to respect them,” Ignacio said.

Based on the latest crowd estimate of the National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) as of 3 p.m., the number of devotees has decreased from 1.5 million to 1.303 million.

Authorities earlier expected a record number of around 10 million devotees for the Traslacion this weekend.

Critics contend that the parade is idolatrous, but Church authorities say it is a vibrant expression of faith in one of the world's most fervently Catholic nations.

More than 80 million of the Asian nation's 100 million people consider themselves Catholics.

Crowned with thorns and bearing a cross, the Nazarene statue was brought to Manila by Augustinian priests in 1607, early on in Spain's 400-year colonial rule.

It is believed by some to have been partially burnt and blackened when the galleon carrying it caught fire on a voyage from Mexico, another Spanish colony at the time. With reports by CBCP News and Agence France-Presse