By Shikin Louis
KUCHING, Dec 25: The upcoming St Thomas Columbarium, slated to complete by the end of next year, can accommodate up to 14,000 niches for storing the ashes of the deceased.
Anglican Bishop of Kuching, the Right Reverend Datuk Danald Jute, said the RM8.5 million project is currently progressing steadily at about 60 per cent completion.
“The physical building will be completed earlier but we will need to work on the niches so that will be quite tedious.
“We are still working on it (number of niches) because it can go up to 14,000 but we are currently working on a conservative number of 9,000,” he said when met during a Christmas Open House at the Bishop’s House, Jalan McDougall here today.
He further said the columbarium construction project is a bit slow since they have two other projects running simultaneously, namely the construction of a youth centre and a kindergarten.
“The construction workers are also focusing on the other two so that the whole three projects will be completed simultaneously.
“Anyway, we are happy with the progress and we are grateful to the Sarawak government for helping with most of the grants for the Columbarium,” he added.
The columbarium is located between St Thomas’ School and the old museum, where the old Anglican cemetery was.
At the same time, Danald who is also the 14th Bishop of the Anglican Church in Sarawak and Brunei, mentioned that significant projects are underway in most of its centers, thanks to the donations from many including Sarawak’s Unit for Other Religions (UNIFOR).
On the Anglican community in Brunei, he said they have remained largely self-sufficient over the years.
However, the post-Covid period brought challenges, with a significant decrease in expatriates where many returned home during the pandemic and found jobs elsewhere, leading to a decline in membership for both the Anglican Church and the wider Christian community in Brunei.
Regarding the size of the Anglican community, Danald estimated that Brunei has approximately 5,000 local Anglican members, while Sarawak boasts a significantly larger congregation of around 160,000. – DayakDaily
