The Bugkalot ethnic community or Ilongot tribe is an indigenous people group found in four provinces of the Philippines: Aurora, Nueva Ecija, Nueva Vizcaya, and Quirino.

Like any tribal group, the Bugkalots are animists in their world view. They live by slash and burn farming, hunting, and fishing by the river. In the oldendays men wore blue g-string while women wore an upper garment with a v-shaped neckline and a skirt wrapped around and held at the waist by a string. However, what made them distinct as a tribal people was their dreaded old practice of headhunting. It was this old custom that made them fearsome among lowlanders and other tribal groups.

In 1954 two missionaries of New Tribes Mission, Florentino Santos and Marvin Graves, braved the mountains of Bugkalot, and brought with them the life-changing message of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Since the entry of the “trail blazers” to the mountains of the headhunters, many more missionaries had followed and planted the seed of the gospel to them. From its first fruit, the first local church was planted in Kapetaan, Aifonso Lista, Casteñeda, Nueva Vizcaya. The number of believers had grown enormously resulting in not only the gradual abandonment of the dreaded custom of headhunting but also in the planting of many more churches in the Bugkalot land.

Today, after more than 5 decades of church planting ministry, an association of churches had already been formed known as the Bugkalot Bible Christian Fellowship (BBCF) with 22-member churches. To better oversee the local churches, the BBCF churches were divided into 3 chapters: Guingin chapter (6 churches), Wasid chapter (9 churches), and Pelaway Chapter (7 churches). Two missionary couples heeded the call and sent by BBCF: Patricio and Mylene Pasigian, presently serving in Wasid Chapter, Nagtipunan, Quirino Province and Peter and Elda Santos, serving among the Central Subanen of Zamboanga del Norte.