Second Beaufort son ordained priest after 25 Years

BEAUFORT – Keningau Diocese has the joy of receiving its second priest from Beaufort after twenty-five years.  Deacon Hilanus Simon, 34, was ordained priest by Bishop Cornelius Piong on 17 Oct 2015 at St Valentine Beaufort, in a concelebrated Mass with clergy from the three dioceses, including his five classmates.  Father Gilbert Engan, the parish priest, was the first Beaufort lad to be accepted into the ordained ministry in 1980.

Hilanus, second in a brood of eight born to a Timorese father and a Dusun mother, a “Dumor” as he styled himself, entered the Aspirancy Programme at the Catholic Archdiocesan Centre Kota Kinabalu in 2007.  He finished his philosophical and theological studies at St Peter’s College Kuching in 2014.  He was ordained deacon together with Fr Harry Dorisoh (ordained priest Oct 10) at Keningau Cathedral on 23 March 2015.  The neo-ordained will begin his priestly ministry at Holy Spirit Sook.