Pilgrims flock to Singai’s holy mount during Lent

ON March 29, under mottled shade cast by large, leafy trees stretching into the bright light of the Saturday morning sun, dozens of young and old made their way steadily along the hardy belian (ironwood) walkway and sturdy staircases up a sacred mountain, located in the heart of Bidayuh country.

For about an hour, this small procession of Roman Catholic pilgrims from St Peter’s Church, Padungan – many with a rosary clasped in hand as they quietly recited prayers – patiently meandered its way up the sides of Mount Singai, only pausing briefly at each of the 14 Stations of the Cross to pray.

Some pilgrims lit candles while others were content just to meditate and reflect on selected readings read out loud by volunteers during each stop.

Their destination was the modest Catholic Memorial and Pilgrimage Centre (CMPC) which lies about one third of the way up the mountain, where they would celebrate Mass followed by a simple lunch prepared by the centre’s handful of staff, before descending later in the day.

One of the organisers, Michael Hii told thesundaypost the pilgrimage to Mt Singai was an annual affair.

“Today we have 176 people comprising parishioners and our Sunday School although we usually have over 300 people,” he said.

Such groups are a common sight on Mt Singai during the Season of Lent, a 40-day period of penance and prayer which starts with Ash Wednesday (Mar 5 this year) and ends on Holy Saturday, the day before Easter Sunday (April 20 this year) which is celebrated by Christians worldwide to remember the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

The St Peter’s group was just one of at least half a dozen groups of pilgrims that day to visit the CMPC, not including individual trekkers and groups of hikers out to enjoy a day in nature’s glory in the foothills of Bau.

While the CMPC welcomes thousands of visitors all year round, it is during the season of Lent and the months of May and October (where Roman Catholics are encouraged to pray the Rosary) which attracts the highest concentration of pilgrims.

Mt Singai is located about 45 minutes’ drive from Kuching city centre and can be reached via the Matang-Sg Tengah road or through the Batu Kawah-Bau road.

It’s not the highest mountain in Sarawak — neither the most picturesque nor most challenging to climb.

But what sets it apart is its historical and spiritual significance, not just to the local Bidayuh people but to the wider Sarawakian Roman Catholic community.

A place of refuge

Mt Singai is a relatively recent settlement, tracing its roots back to early Bidayuh settlers who arrived from Kalimantan Borneo in the early 1800’s, seeking to escape attacks from their enemies, according to CMPC’s current chairman Vincent Eddy, 64.

The mountain’s steep slopes and high elevation offered protection from enemies and made it an ideal spot for the people to set up a cluster of eight villages or kampungs – Daun, Giang, Moti, Puot, Sajong, Saga, Somu and Tuben – about a quarter of the way up the mountain.

The villagers practised Adat Gawai, based on a form of ancestor spirit worship called leng Sumuk leng Babai while also believing in gods and supreme beings.

Mt Singai is also the birthplace of Christianity among the Bidayuh community in Bau — thanks largely to a young Roman Catholic priest from Holland named Father Felix Westerwoudt who arrived in Kuching in 1885.

He was to take the place of Brother Francis Dibona, a sub-deacon who had been called to Singapore to be ordained as a priest.

Soon after, Fr Westerwoudt made his first trip to Singai, about a day’s journey through swamps and jungles where he asked and received permission from the chief to build a house in the style of the locals just below Kampung Daun.

For 13 years, he lived side by side with the Bidayuh, learning their language and culture and going from village to village to persuade the people to convert to Christianity. However, his efforts were largely unsuccessful as the people held on to their pagan practices.

His attempts to teach some of the boys reading, writing and arithmetic were also not well-received. Five and a half years later, the arrival of Franciscan sisters brought much welcomed help and relief to Fr Westerwoudt who had until then, laboured on his own. It also meant the Bidayuh girls could also be taught proper hygiene and housework.

“When the sisters first came, the villagers fled from them because of the sisters’ white coifs and black tunics. The villagers thought they were ghosts,” Vincent recalled.

Slowly, after a number of years, only a handful of the Bidayuh boys and girls were baptised into Catholicism.

Fr Westerwoudt would never get to witness the fruit of his efforts as he passed away in Kuching on April 13, 1898, at the age of 37 after a severe illness.

At the time of his death, only seven Singai families had converted to Christianity.

Fr Albert Reyffert, Fr Westerwoudt’s childhood friend and also his successor at Singai, arranged for the seven families to start a new settlement at Kampung Sagah, Matang, where he also established a mission school.

The Catholic families prospered in their new environment and before long, their former non-Catholic neighbours also began to send their children to the mission school. Many of the students became Catholics and chose to stay on at Sagah, gradually resulting in a declining population living on the mountain.

After many years, the original Singai settlements fell deserted with villagers only returning to harvest fruit from their land during the fruit season.

Return to Singai

It wasn’t until 1981, when the Catholic church in Sarawak celebrated the 100th anniversary of the arrival of the first Catholic missionaries that the Bidayuh returned to Mt Singai.

Fr Josef Schmolzer (fondly known as Fr Sepp), an Austrian priest who was then serving in the Bau/Lundu parish, suggested returning to the original settlement to celebrate the event at the parish level (what is now St Stephen’s Parish).

His suggestion was well received by the Bidayuh community, especially among the elder generation.

On July 12, 1981, about 400 Catholics representing all the Singai kampungs, returned for the first time to their ancestral home.

With the help of the elderly members, the group found the remnants of the first church and house which Fr Westerwoudt had built. A site was cleared, a simple bamboo altar was erected and prayers offered.

“Fr Sepp was a well-loved priest because of the way he reached out to the people. He also loved the mountain. It was Fr Sepp who really started the ball rolling on the idea of rebuilding the place,” recalled Vincent who was among those who first returned to the site in 1981.

“He knew the people revered the mountain as their ancestral home. He felt it was a good idea to bring the people back, at least occasionally to where they came from and to rediscover their roots, a place to say prayers of thanksgiving and intercession for the Parish and for the people.”

Pilgrimages begin

The first pilgrimage to Mt Singai took place on August 10, 1981. The second on April 23-24, 1982, coinciding with Vocation Sunday, was the first over-night visit and an all-night vigil as there was no place to sleep.

Under Fr Sepp’s spiritual guidance and support, more pilgrimages were organised on important Feast Days of the church.

“A group of us would come on Saturday afternoon where we would set up camp for the night. On Sunday morning, we would celebrate Mass and have fellowship before climbing down later in the day.

“In those days, it wasn’t easy to get here. There were no stairs like you see now. We had to climb through the jungle and use our parangs (knives with large multi-pupose blades) to clear the way,” Vincent shared.

As the number of pilgrims kept on increasing, it became clear some kind of plan and strategy was needed to develop facilities and oversee pilgrimages to the site.

On August 15, 1983, the Pinginatong Pimuka Eklesia (PPE) (Remembrance of the Founding of the Church) committee was established. It was made up of church and kampung leaders of the Singai villages and chaired by Philip Juin, then the Penghulu of Singai.

With financial aid from overseas obtained through Fr Sepp and other well-wishers as well as government grants, the PPE committee built a chapel, a Shrine dedicated to Mother Mary, a longhouse, a small kitchen and quarters for priests and religious.

“Fr Sepp also gave spiritual guidance and support to the committee. During the construction, he would visit the site regularly — at least three times a week with his faithful dog, Lobo,” recalled Vincent fondly.

Fast growth

The increase in the number of pilgrims continued to outpace the capacity of existing facilities, necessitating additional upgrades and development which required funds well beyond the RM15,000 Fr Sepp had left the committee before his return to Europe in 1991 after completing his service in Sarawak.

The PPE was rebranded as the CMPC for the purpose of applying for a license from the government to enable the committee to raise and solicit funds from members of the public.

Before Fr Sepp returned home, he entrusted the task of completing the CMPC’s construction to Vincent who then headed the sub-committee for fund-raising and building.

The target was to collect RM2 million which seemed like an outrageous sum at the time but with prayer, trust and hundreds of letters of appeal, the funds came pouring in, Vincent said.

Community effort

Another remarkable characteristic of the CMPC is that it was built by the community in the spirit of gotong-royong.

Everything used to build the facilities – bricks, belian planks, sand, cement — was carried up by hand.

All the churches in the Bau-Lundu parish participated in the construction and a roster was drawn up with the names of the volunteer teams. Their names would be read during the Sunday notices to remind them to come and carry building materials up the jungle trail on the slope of Mt Singai, Vincent added.

Skilled labourers were recruited from the villages to take care of construction.

Even visitors and pilgrims were roped in to help. Materials such as sand, packed in small bags, and bricks were placed at the foot of the mountain and whoever was heading up to the centre could just take up as much or as little as they wanted to carry.

Even then, the work was hard and progress was slow.

The CMPC was eventually completed and blessed by His Grace the Archbishop Datuk Peter Chung on Sept 5, 1995, as part of the Parish Double Jubilee Celebrations.

Later, more facilities were added and expanded as funds became available.

During the Jubilee Year 2000 programme, the centre was officially dedicated to Christ the King, blessed and declared as a place for pilgrimages by the same Archbishop on Nov 21, 1999.

Since then, thousands of people have visited the centre, not only Catholics but also other Christian groups, both locally and from overseas.

Among the facilities the centre has today are a church in the stylings of a Baruk (Bidayuh ceremonial house) with a 300- person capacity, a number of wooden longhouse hostels, an open-air canteen, toilets, and an open-air grotto.

There are also 14 Stations of the Cross placed at various intervals, starting with the first at the foot of the mountain and the last at the centre itself.

A mini-amphitheater with a capacity of 1,200 people was also added in 2004 but it is presently being repaired after suffering damage in Sept last year after a mango tree fell on it due to strong winds. During the same period, a longhouse and water tanks were also damaged when two durian trees fell on them.

“For the time being, we do not have any plans to expand. We are giving priority to the amphitheathre to get fixed first,” Vincent shared.