<P> To compensate for this loss of manpower, the remaining Augustinians intensified the recruitment and formation of Filipino candidates . And as the number of the latter increased and their preparedness adequately established, the idea of creating a new Province came to be seriously considered . </P> <P> Plans for the organization of such a Province began in 1974 when the Regional Assembly of the Philippine Augustinian Vicariate asked for the creation of a Vice-Province in the islands . Though the plan was not realized, it was again revived by a group of Filipino Augustinians at a meeting in the Basilica Minore del Santo Niño in Cebu on April 29, 1981 . The plan this time was for the creation of a new Province . The move to create a new Province, which would be called the Province of Sto . Niño de Cebu - Philippines, was officially endorsed by the Regional Assembly of the Augustinian Vicariate of the Philippines at the closing of its sessions on August 19, 1981, in the Monastery of San Agustin, Intramuros, Manila, and by the Provincial Chapter of the Province of the Most Holy Name of Jesus of the Philippines, held in Valladolid, Spain on July 17, 1982 . The proposal was overwhelmingly approved by the members of the 174th General Chapter held in Rome on September 15, 1983, and the new province was canonically established on December 25, 1983 . </P> <P> The province was officially formed on September 13, 1983, inside the Istituto Patristico Augustinianum in Rome during the 174th General Chapter of the Augustinian Order, where ninety - three delegates approved the creation of the first indigenous Augustinian province in Asia after over 400 years of control by Spanish religious leaders . The Province of Sto . Niño de Cebu gained autonomy from the mother province, the Province of the Most Holy Name of Jesus of the Philippines, which is based in Spain . </P> <P> The first Prior Provincial was Rev. Fr . Eusebio B. Berdon, OSA, who later became an assistant Prior General of the Order in Rome . Initially, the Province had thirty - six friars and religious brothers and sixty - one aspirants, novices, postulants and theology students . </P>

When was the santo niño de cebu parish of biñan laguna founded