Putatan church building project to have fundraising bazaar July 23

PUTATAN –  A fundraising bazaar will be held at the Sacred Heart Cathedral in Kota Kinabalu on Sunday 23 July 2017 in aid of the new St Catherine Laboure Church that is now under construction on a beautiful hilltop site at Kg Dimbaan here.

Archbishop John Wong made another site inspection to check on the latest progress of the building project on June 28.

Abp Wong was accompanied by Msgr Primus Jouil, his vicar general, who is also the adviser of the steering committee for the building project.

On hand to brief the church leaders on various aspects of progress and development of the project were: Datuk Stephen Sondoh, chairman of the committee; Tan Jun Kwang, the architect; Dominic Chong, committee treasurer; and other officials.

Construction work on the four-storey structure had been at a slow pace, dictated by the availability of funds. Datuk Stephen said with roughly RM1.2 million funds in hand, there is still a shortfall required for the completion of the building project.

“From the fundraising bazaar at the Sacred Heart Cathedral on July 23, and a charity golf tournament at the Bongawan Golf & Country Club in August, we hope to raise a sum of RM300,000 to meet the shortfall,” he said.

With the limited funds available, Abp Wong advised the building committee to focus its attention on the completion of the main building structures and defer other needs, like the purchase of a church bell from Europe and the installation of wooden pews, to a later date.

Tan, the project architect, told the visitors at the site meeting that the roof structures were completed in May and that about 80 per cent of the roof coverings have so far been installed.

He said work is now centred on the construction of the structures of the bell tower at the front of the church building and that this phase of work is expected to be completed in a month’s time.

Msgr Jouil expressed the hope that the new church would become a centre for Catholics in the area to worship, that they would fully support the ongoing fundraising efforts, thus enabling the successful completion of the building project.

The committee hopes that, if all goes according to plan, the main building project would be completed in about one year’s time. – SOCCOM ADKK