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By Herbie Gomez
, Correspondent
First of three parts
CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY — Former mayor Ruben Ecleo
Jr. of San Jose, Surigao del Norte, is a wanted man. He is accused
of killing his own wife Alona in Cebu last January and has been
ordered arrested to stand trial for parricide.
But he is not merely a politician or a son of
Surigao del Norte Rep. Glenda Ecleo. He is the “supreme
president” of a Mindanao-based cult with members willing to die
for their “master.”
Such zealotry could be attributed to Ecleo’s
late father Ruben Sr. from whom the ex-mayor inherited the cult’s
mantle of leadership.
For 37 years, the Surigao del Norte-based Ecleo
cult, Philippine Benevolent Missionaries Association (PBMA), has
been preaching a doctrine lifted from the teachings of Christianity,
Buddhism and Hinduism mixed with occultism and astrology.
Founders
It was the late Ruben Ecleo Sr. who started it
all.
In 1965, the “divine master” and a handful of his followers
formally organized the PBMA in Ozamiz City.
Its incorporators were Ecleo, Arsenio Nazareno
of Calbayog, Francisco Enerio of Misamis Oriental, Floro Caboverde
of Zamboanga City, Carlos Lomanta of Ozamiz, Maximo Ravelo of Davao
Oriental; Pedro Montives of Leyte, Dionisio Cui of Davao del Norte,
Victoriano Rafols of Lanao del Norte, and Eusebio Bandivas,
Casiano Gorrea and Maximo Caboverde of Zamboanga del Norte.
The elder Ecleo’s “missionary work,”
however, started much earlier than 1965.
First Apostles
Between 1958 and 1963, the years Ecleo
supposedly immersed himself in his “missionary work.” Thus, the
“divine master” collected the apostles who referred to as the
“First Thirteen.”
Two PBMA incorporators, Nazareno and Enerio,
were among the Ecleo apostles. The others were Cipriano Otero of
Gingoog City, his wife’s brother Ruben Buray of Misamis Oriental,
cousins George and Cupertino Edera of Basilisa and Martin Laturnas
of Bohol, Ignacio Sombrado of Bohol, Teodoro Regacion of Leyte,
Pedro Toquib of Bukidnon and Benjamin Ratonil of Cebu.
The “First Thirteen,” like the early New
Testament apostles, were sent out by Ecleo to preach, “heal” the
sick and recruit followers.
Mystical childhood
The PBMA claims Ecleo started his “mission”
as early as 1941 when the PBMA founder was still a boy. At eight, it
said the boy Ruben had “reached far places on mission” and that
he had received “dictations from the spiritual realm” in the
mountains of northern Leyte at the age of 11.
He began his “full mission” a year later,
when he was already 12.
The “dictations,” according to the PBMA,
came in the form of a voice from Devachan while Ecleo was
meditating, surrounded by “pythons, deadly insects, venomous
vipers and reptiles.”
Devachan, in Indian, is the equivalent of the
word “paradise” to Christians, a second heaven for the soul and
a place of rest to Buddhists.
The PBMA also claims Ecleo was guided by the
Arhat and taught by the Avatar.
Arhat is a Buddhist term for “worthy one” or
“destroyer of the foe (ignorance),” a title given to those who
have achieved “Nirvana” which is the state wherein a man is
believed to have been freed from suffering or from the cycle of
birth and death. In Hindu usage, Avatar refers to any incarnation of
the god Vishnu. Used generally, it refers to any descent of a god
into the world in human form.
(To be continued)
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