Father Tobias Chi was the rector of Sacred Heart Church in 1970, taking over from Father Dominic Bekema, mhm. The church then was 21 years old (built in 1949) and facing dangerous structural problems.

“The people who came to church were afraid because they did not feel safe. They sat near the doors … and Bishop Buis was not very happy because he (Fr Bekema) called it a cathedral because he (Buis) was not bishop of a diocese,”

said Fr Chi. The problems had developed because Fr Bekema had extended the church without regard to its structural consequences.

The permanent solution was to build a new church, all the more justified when Sacred Heart Church became a cathedral in 1976. Fr Chi’s idea of a new church was conceived when he was in Sandakan, before he even came to Sacred Heart. The details were so vivid in his mind that he even made a model of it. Father Preyde, who was then in Lahad Datu, liked it so much that he took it away with him, promising to return it, but he never did. When Fr Chi came to Sacred Heart and the building of a new cathedral was being planned in the early 1970s, he had to design a new one. He took inspiration from pictures of neo-catechumenate churches in Spain and Italy. He knew what he wanted in the new cathedral building and made a drawing of his idea.

At that time, Datuk Herman Luping was the chairman of the parish council. It so happened that an architect from England dropped by. He was on leave and Luping introduced him to Fr Chi. He was amazed at Fr Chi’s drawing, exclaiming, “You know all about buildings!” The architect was asked to make drawings of a new cathedral. However, they were not accepted by the parish council. The council decided to make use of local architects for the drawings. The principal architect was Shen Dah Cheong of Wisma Arkitek, with a lot of input from Fr Chi.

Unlike the old cathedral whose main entrance faced the main road, the new cathedral faces the opposite way. The back of the cathedral, which houses the Blessed Sacrament Chapel, faces the main road and is air-conditioned 24 hours a day. Fr Chi explained that this was deliberately designed as such so that the chapel would act as a sound barrier to the main cathedral building – which is to overcome the noise caused by the busy traffic plying the main road. By having the chapel air-conditioned 24/7 enables the cathedral to be relatively quiet and distraction free during liturgical functions.

Regarding raising funds for the new cathedral, besides the big ones who donated, Fr Chi remembered individuals who came to his office and gave “small” amounts but “they gave with their hearts, which touched me. This was really the people’s church, they built it,” he said.

In reflecting on the contemporary design of the cathedral, Fr Chi said that he liked what the neo-catechumenate churches had in Spain and Italy. For instance, at the entrance of the church lies the baptismal font. By having the baptismal font there, representing the first sacrament of the church, the people would encounter this first as they enter the church. But in the new cathedral, this was somehow not achieved and the baptismal pool was placed not in the cathedral but in the chapel. Anyhow, he said, where he did not succeed, Fr Cosmas Lee, as rector, did in 1998. And Fr Chi was very pleased that in the end this was achieved.

Fr Chi also explained further the “futuristic” design of the new cathedral. One can say, he said, that the base design was likened to a spaceship – narrow at the back (the Blessed Sacrament Chapel) and wide in front for the cathedral. What was notable was the massive roof structure that dominated the design, likened to the shape of a “tent,” a symbol of the church where the people of God, the Jews, met in the Old Testament.