Apollo Quiboloy called himself the “Appointed Son of God.”
But to Filipino and American authorities, he was a man wanted for years on charges of sexual abuse and human trafficking.
Quiboloy, the 74-year-old leader of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ, surrendered to authorities on September 8 after 2,000 security officers descended on the religious sect’s massive complex in Davao City in the Philippines. Thousands of followers gathered at the 74-acre compound to protest Quiboloy’s arrest as videos of his sermons blared on the building’s giant screens.
Authorities have accused Quiboloy of rape—including of minors—and engaging in sex trafficking, fraud, and smuggling cash into the US. Quiboloy’s lawyers denied these charges.
Quiboloy, who claims to have millions of followers in 200 countries around the world, is politically powerful. He has a close relationship with former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte, allowing him to continue preaching even as the FBI placed him on its most wanted list. It was only after Duterte stepped down in 2022 that Philippine authorities brought charges against him and issued a warrant for his arrest.
The Kingdom of Jesus Christ is one of many sects that have sprouted up in the Philippines. They have an outsized impact on the country’s politics and culture. Because the Philippines is an archipelago of 7,000 islands, different homegrown religious leaders often come to represent certain regions, knitting people’s faith and identity closely together.
In a 2022 CT article, Timoteo D. Gener, chair of Philippine Council of Evangelical Church’s Theological Council, noted that indigenous non-Trinitarian heretical groups like Iglesia Ni Cristo, Ang Dating Daan (The Old Path), and Kingdom of Jesus Christ have grown out of “the prevalence of modalism, the belief that God is a single person who reveals himself in three forms, among folk Catholics. Countering modalism in faith and practice remains a continuing challenge for biblical Christians in the country.”
Another similarity in these communities is that they often center around a messianic leader. This is an idea that is attractive to the Filipino psyche, according to Rod Santos, a minister at Greenhills Christian Fellowship, an adjunct professor at the International Graduate School of Leadership, and the author of a book on why Filipino evangelicals disaffiliate.
“Historically, we as a people adore and value tagapamagitan [“intermediary”] figures,” Santos told CT. “There is always somebody who will be a go-between because it’s impossible to go straight to the mayor or it’s hard to court this girl, so you will need a ‘bridge.’ Likewise, we long for a deliverer, a savior who will save us from oppression or poverty.”
Here is a summary of the beliefs and origins of four Filipino local religious groups: Kingdom of Jesus Christ, Iglesia Ni Cristo, Ang Dating Daan, and Philippine Benevolent Missionaries Association.
Kingdom of Jesus Christ (KOJC)
Quiboloy claims that he started KOJC in 1985 after he heard God whisper, “I will use you” while attending a Billy Graham event in South Korea a decade earlier. Formerly a pastor in the United Pentecostal Church of the Philippines, Quiboloy left to start his own church after the denomination began investigating him for unorthodox teaching and disparagement of fellow pastors.
KOJC started with 15 people and grew quickly in the Philippines and among the Filipino diaspora. Today, the sect reports between 3 and 7 million members worldwide, according to The New York Times.
Quiboloy considers himself the “Appointed Son of God” because “he was the first man to have endured all the fiery trials of persecution and hardship and to have overcome them all without breaking his covenant with the Father,” according to an archived page of Quiboloy’s website. “He was the first man to finally eject the serpent seed, breaking the chain of sin by his absolute obedience to the Father’s will.”
The website went on to say that those who listen to Quiboloy, believe in him, and repent “will enter in the Kingdom of God on Earth today, and after judgment, unto eternity.”
In 2021, a federal grand jury in California indicted Quiboloy, claiming that girls as young as 12 who worked as Quiboloy’s personal assistants (called “pastorals”) were forced to have sex with Quiboloy or else risk “eternal damnation.” In addition, the group sent its members to cities in the US to solicit donations for a “charity”; the funds instead financed the lavish lifestyle of the KOJC leaders.
Iglesia Ni Cristo (INC)
Established in 1914 by Felix Y. Manalo, this religious group now has 7,000 congregations across 166 countries and territories, with about 3 million members worldwide. Followers of Iglesia Ni Cristo made up 2.6 percent of the Filipino population as of 2020, making it the third-largest religion in the country after Roman Catholicism and Islam.
Like Quiboloy, Manalo is viewed as a messianic figure, known as the “Messenger of God in the Last Days” and the angel from the east mentioned in Revelation 7:1–3. In Understanding the Iglesia Ni Cristo, Anne C. Harper noted that Manalo believed “his work is God’s last work of salvation,” according to official INC lessons.
“INC teaches that it is the only true church and the continuation of the church founded by Christ Himself,” she wrote.
The group asserts the only way to receive salvation is to join INC. Followers also recognize Jesus’ humanity only, not his deity. “We do not subscribe to the belief that Christ is a God-Man or both God and man,” INC’s website states. “He had in so many instances introduced Himself as the Son of God but never did He appropriate the title ‘God’ nor ‘God the Son’ for Himself because He is not God but a man.”
INC also endorses candidates whom its followers vote for in a bloc. As a sign of the group’s political influence, Duterte appointed INC executive minister Eduardo V. Manalo as special envoy for overseas Filipino concerns, a role he continues under current president Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
INC members who left or criticized the religion have faced intimidation and violence, according to an investigation by Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s The Fifth Estate. In 2018, Canada granted ex-INC minister Lowell Menorca asylum, as the immigration and refugee board believed the group had “both the means and the motivation to seriously harm or kill” him if he returned to the Philippines.
Members Church of God International (MCGI), better known as Ang Dating Daan (ADD)
Eliseo F. Soriano, a former leader in an INC offshoot church called Iglesia ng Dios kay Kristo Hesus, Haligi at Suhay ng Katotohanan (“Church of God in Christ Jesus, Pillar and Ground of Truth”), started MCGI in 1977. The group started to grow rapidly after it began using radio and later TV programs—most famously Ang Dating Daan—to broadcast its message. During the 30-minute show, Soriano would discuss passages of the Bible, debunking the beliefs of other religious groups.
“Although ADD members claim to believe the Bible as their only source of authority, this is [only] half-true,” said the blog The Bereans: Apologetics Research Ministry. “They also believe Eliseo Soriano is the ‘sent one’ or ‘sugo’ the reason why he alone does the Bible explaining. In other words, an individual member could not just explain the Bible out of his own personal study.”
Soriano’s teachings reject the Trinity. He often cites Matthew 3:16–17 to make the claim that during Jesus’ baptism, God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit were in three different locations, so they cannot be one. The Bereans also noted that followers believe Jesus is not the only Savior of humanity but that Moses, Paul, and Timothy were also saviors, and on his second coming, Jesus will save ADD members.
The number of ADD members is not public, yet the group has churches, known as “locales,” across the country and the world. The group’s 143-acre headquarters in Pampanga province includes a massive conference center that is one of the largest indoor facilities in Southeast Asia.
On his program, Soriano often skewered INC’s beliefs, leading INC to create its own TV show Ang Tamang Daan (The Right Path) to refute ADD. In 2003, INC sued Soriano for libel and later won its case. In 2006, a court issued a warrant for Soriano’s arrest on charges of raping his former aide, Daniel Veridiano. To escape what MCGI called “religious persecution,” Soriano fled to Brazil in 2005, where he continued to lead his ministry until he died in 2021.
Philippine Benevolent Missionaries Association (PBMA)
Another religious group centered around a messiah figure, PBMA, was founded by Ruben Edera Ecleo Sr. in Dinagat Islands in 1965. Ecleo claimed to have learned Arabic, Hebrew, Sanskrit, and Aramaic, which allowed him to interpret “ancient mysteries.” Through uttering a mantra given by God, he claimed to possess supernatural abilities, including appearing in more than one place at the same time, transfiguration, and the ability to heal and even resurrect the dead.
At its peak, PBMA had between 1 and 3 million members nationwide, according to the Philippine National Police. Unlike the other three groups, which primarily base their beliefs on Christianity, PBMA’s doctrine is a mix of Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, Jewish, and Akashic ideas.
PBMA teaches that the new heaven and new earth will be in Dinagat Islands, where the group’s shrine is located, said Fred Dungganon, an evangelical pastor in Manila who grew up in the religious group. PBMA also teaches that God is Ecleo, and Jesus Christ is his son, Ruben Ecleo Jr., he added.
The founder was also the mayor of San Jose from 1963 until he died in 1987. Ecleo Jr. took over leadership of the group and succeeded him as the elected mayor of San Jose. He later became the representative of Dinagat Islands’ sole district.
PBMA’s numbers dwindled after Ecleo Sr.’s death and then again in 2002 after Ecleo Jr. was accused and later convicted of murdering his wife. Similar to Quiboloy’s arrest, PBMA’s followers squared off with police as they sought to issue Ecleo Jr. a warrant. In the ensuing shootout, 16 PBMA members and 1 police officer were killed. Ecleo Jr. escaped arrest until 2020. He died from cardiac arrest a year later while imprisoned.
Dungganon, who now leads Blessed Church Manila, said he remembers seeing PBMA members heal illness and perform miracles presumably through reciting mantras. In 1998, he accepted Jesus at a church youth camp but ended up backsliding and returning to PBMA, even becoming a faith healer himself.
One night in 1999 after healing a feverish infant, he couldn’t sleep. “I didn’t feel satisfaction in what I was doing,” he recalled. “No joy, no peace.” He recalled the unexplainable joy he had felt at the camp and began searching for truth in the Bible. A few months later, he surrendered his life to the Lord, leaving PBMA and facing persecution from his family and friends in the group. “There was no turning back,” he said. “The grace of God was so overwhelming, and my experience with Jesus was incomparably better than my previous faith.”
Santos noted that some of these pastors initially started with orthodox Christian doctrines but found that they could amass a larger gathering by promising deliverance. “Since no one is checking them, then they are not accountable to anybody, leading them to [start] a cult.”
To reach more people like Dungganon, Santos said that Filipino evangelicals can take advantage of the cultural inclination to seek a mediator by pointing those enmeshed in unorthodox movements to the true Messiah. “To connect with them, Christians can emphasize the role of Jesus, the Son of God, as the only true Mediator and Messiah.”
