Cabletow 4th issue - GM Ebdane - Grand Lodge of the Philippines

The Cabletow
MW REYNOLD S. FAJARDO, PGM, GMH
A EULOGY
by MW REYNATO S. PUNO
Since the dawn of time, mankind has viewed death from different perspectives.
Some consider death as the ultimate equalizer. As well put by Socrates, the midwife
of wisdom, “you can say many things about death but you cannot fault its impartiality.”
On the other hand, Shakespeare spoke of his fear of death; fear of the uncertainty
of its coming. He warned that man should guard against the “inaudible and noiseless
foot of death as it passes by.” Still on the other, the writer of Ecclesiastes called our
attention about the inevitability of death. He wrote: “No one can hold back his spirit
from departing; no one has the power to prevent his day of death, for there is no
discharge from that obligation, no exemption from that dark battle.”
MW Reynold Fajardo answered the summons of death last January 27. but even
while he has travelled to the land where no man has returned, we gathered this
evening to pay tribute to his imperishable spirit, that spirit that will always be with
us, the spirit of a brother Mason now in the bosom of the Great Architect of the
Universe.
MW Fajardo’s public and Masonic lives are well chronicled. In both his public and
Masonic lives, we can say, without provoking the arching of a quizzical eyebrow,
that he did exceedingly well. I essay this conclusion with confidence for I am a
personal witness to his exemplary career as a Mason and as a public servant. I was
GM in 1984 and he served as my Senior Grand Warden. But before that, in the
turbulent decade of the ‘70s or some 35 years ago, we were the young Turks in the
Grand Lodge engaging its Old Guards in both earthly and esoteric arguments but
always abiding with their wisdom derived from the ages. I worked with him in the
Department of Justice when he was a rising star in the Public Assistance Office
while I was making my own mark in the Office of the Solicitor General. For a long
while, our career paths traversed each other, and this gave me the opportunity to
get an unencumbered view of what now constitutes as his footprints on the sand of
life.
As a Mason, MW Fajardo has successfully climbed the mountain top of Masonry
– the Grand East. In our post-war history, he is one of the blessed few who got
elected as GM on his second try, an irrefutable proof of the brethren’s regard and
respect for him. As GM, he constituted five of our Lodges: Mandaluyong Lodge No.
277 (Mandaluyong City), Talavera Lodge No. 273 (Talavera, N.E.), Don Salvador P.
Lopez Memorial Lodge No. 276 (Mati, Davao Oriental), Illana Bay Lodge No. 274
(Pagadian City) and Margosatubig Lodge No. 275.
13 Cabletow