Village Chapel Development Fund (Part 3)

Mr. Luke Sagoi is at a loss as how to source for fund to complete the building of St. Luke the Evangelist's Chapel. Mr. Luke is the Chairman of village church committee of Kampong Petag and the villagers had been working hard not only to raise fund but also building the chapel on community help basis, commonly called gotong royong.

In 2008 the committee proposed to organise a fund-raising dinner either at the zone or parish level but was unable to carry out the project due to manpower constraints.

On May 9, 2009 I visited Kampong Sta’ang for the family game day together with Friar Gerard Victor, OFM and Friar Joseph Lee, OFM. On our way back, we stopped at Kampong Petag to have a look at the chapel. The condition of the chapel was very depressing indeed.

Friar Gerard Victor, OFM confided with me early this year that this chapel would be his first priority. I understand his aspiration.

Mr. Luke informed me last week that he needed about RM40,000 to complete the chapel.

These pictures were taken in May last year.

Village Chapel Development Fund (Part 2)

Travelling along the winding gravelled Padawan Road past Kampong Belimbing one can be forgiven if he/she misses Kampong Tatuk as it is a small village of scattered dwellings. I for one thought that this was part of kampong Braang Belimbing in view of their proximity.

I had on two occasions in 2007 visited the village accompanying Friar Joseph Goh. The first visit was on April 8, 2007 to preside the election of the village church committee. I was amazed with the resilience of the group despite all the difficulties. Firstly, the small community is a group of five families but they managed to form their village church committee. Secondly, many of them actually worked and stayed in the city. If I not mistaken, Mr. Poster Sungu, the Chairman stayed in Taman Landeh. But during the weekend they would return to the village to meet their love ones and assemble as one community at St. James’s Chapel.

When I asked Catechist Stephen Jawum which chapel in his opinion to be assisted first, the answered was St. James’ kampong Tatuk. Seeing the condition of the building I tend to agree fully.

Village Chapel Development Fund (Part 1)

The parish of St. Ann made a ground breaking approval at the parish council AGM in December 2009 to apportion part of the fund raised during the feastday celebration for the improvement/development of village chapels with pressing need. For this reason the parish council had increased the target to be raised at this year's feastday celebration.

In my many visits with the priest to the villages I have seen some very rundown chapels but the community are either too poor or small in number that they are not able to raise fund to make improvement to the chapels. The situation is very pressing indeed and it is my hope that some good persons reading this will come to the rescue, supporting this project.

For a start I will show the pictures of St. Paul's Chapel, Kampong Batu Gong, an Iban village off 18th Mile, Kuching/Serian Road. The Chairman of the chapel's committee is Mr. Felix Endawie.

Last week the members of the Iban Apostolate of St. Ann's parish organised a one-day community work to help cleaning up the chapel's area.