China priests in Sabah: Exile, mission and the witness of Fr Tobias Chi

WE have many fathers – fathers by blood, fathers-in-law by marriage, godfathers by baptism, and above all, our Heavenly Father. But between earth and eternity walks a special kind for Catholics: fathers who do not raise children, yet dedicate their lives to shepherding souls – some of them coming from far away, across oceans and cultures, to become fathers to a people not their own.

The Catholic story in Sabah was shaped not only by diocesan plans or missionary strategy, but also by displacement – by lives uprooted and vocations carried across seas by men who did not choose exile, yet chose fidelity within it.

This pattern belongs to the wider history of mission in Asia, where the Gospel rarely travelled by comfort. Through empire, war and revolution, faith moved through uncertainty and sacrifice. Mission was never about efficiency; it was about staying long enough for faith to take root.

The mid-20th century brought one of its deepest ruptures. With the rise of communism in China, religious life was dismantled. Seminaries closed. Priests were silenced, imprisoned or expelled. Many faced a stark choice: abandon priesthood, or abandon home.

Some chose neither retreat nor resentment. They carried their priesthood elsewhere. Behind the language of “mission” and “reassignment” lay a painful human cost – leaving parents, language, culture and birthplace. These men did not set out to be heroes. They simply refused to let history extinguish their vocation.

China-born priests in North Borneo: When Sabah became home

Scattered across Southeast Asia, a small but remarkable group of China-born priests found their way to North Borneo. They arrived not as pioneers chasing opportunity, but as men shaped by loss, carrying formation, faith and a quiet determination to serve wherever they were sent.

They entered a young local Church still finding its footing, navigating post-war reconstruction, colonial transition and deep cultural diversity. The Mill Hill Missionaries had laid strong foundations of evangelisation, education and parish life. Alongside them came these Chinese priests – trained in China, Macau and Hong Kong – bringing not only sacramental ministry, but linguistic sensitivity and deep pastoral instinct.

Among them were Fr John Tsung (1918–1993), Fr Peter Ma (1925–2013), Fr Aloysius Tung (1926–2016) and Fr Tobias Chi (1924–2010). With the exception of Fr Ma, who later died in New York, the rest would spend their lives and eventually die on Sabahan soil. That detail matters. This was not temporary mission work. Sabah became home.

These priests were not mere sacramental functionaries. They learned the land and its people, travelled rough roads, sat at kitchen tables, listened to grief spoken haltingly and celebrated joy expressed quietly. They served parishes, taught Scripture, formed catechists, accompanied families and carried the invisible weight of souls.

Their ability to minister in Mandarin and Chinese dialects was invaluable to the growing Chinese Catholic community in Sabah. Yet their deeper gift lay elsewhere: they learn how to belong. They did not hover above the community; they entered it. In a Church shaped by linguistic and cultural plurality, they became bridges of communion, helping Chinese Catholic life take root within Sabah’s wider ecclesial tapestry.

Fr Tobias Chi Shu Chang: A shepherd who stayed

It is within this lineage of exile turned mission, displacement turned pastoral presence – that the life of the late Fr Tobias Chi must be remembered as an example. I relate to him most clearly through my own encounters with him during his years at St Mary’s in the early 1990s. I knew him by presence – by seeing him at work, at prayer, on mission, quietly visionary.

To understand priests fully, we must first appreciate where they come from – their upbringing and formation, their loneliness and struggles, their longing for belonging and their desire to serve. These are not footnotes to their vocation; they are the threads that shape it. Behind every pastoral style lies a personal history, and behind every strength, a wound once carried. For beneath the collar is a human heart. Priests feel. Priests suffer. And, at times, they falter not because they are unfaithful, but because they are human.

Tobias Chi was born in the small village of Yenki, Manchuria, on 18 August 1924, and ordained quietly in a Macau chapel on August 14, 1954, Fr Tobias’ priesthood began far from home. None of his family could be present. Yet the missionaries carried the news back to his village, telling his mother that her son was now a priest. His father has passed on. She wept in quiet joy. From that tender, unseen beginning, Fr Tobias was posted to North Borneo arriving on October 8, 1954.

For 56 years, he walked patiently with the people of Sabah – not as one who passed through, but as a shepherd who stayed, serving faithfully. His priestly journey carried him across Sabah, from early ministry in Kudat, Lahad Datu, Tenom, Tanjung Aru, and Beaufort between 1954 and 1970, to Sacred Heart, Kota Kinabalu (1970–1983), St Mary’s, Sandakan (1984–1999) and finally St Peter’s, Kudat (2000–2004).

15 years of staying: Fr Tobias Chi at St Mary’s Church, Sandakan

Those who knew Fr Tobias as Rector remember a line that became legendary in parish life: “No preparation, no celebration!” It was more than a slogan. It was his pastoral philosophy. Sharon Ho and Magdalene Chu remembered that behind every feast day and liturgy lay careful planning, prayerful preparation and shared responsibility. Little wonder that celebrations at St Mary’s were not only beautiful, but deeply participated – a parish taught to prepare its heart before lifting its voice.

When Fr Tobias arrived in October 1984, he did not inherit a blank canvas. The parish was already alive. What he brought was discernment – a pastoral instinct for what needed strengthening, gathering and gentle renewal.

He did not rush change. He listened first, observing how people prayed, gathered and struggled to belong in a parish growing in size, diversity and complexity. Evangelisation was his early priority, understood not as persuasion but as invitation. Talks for seekers led naturally, in 1985, to the establishment of Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA), anchoring the parish in patient accompaniment. By 1987, evangelisation grew more creative through the Good Tidings Concert and Good Tidings Magazine, drawing together parish groups, language communities, youth and families. Evangelisation, for him, was something the parish learned to do together.

Unity, he knew, required structure that listened. In 1986, he convened the first Annual Delegates Assembly, gathering representatives from every parish group to reflect, discern and elect Parish Council leaders. It was pastoral inclusion – authority shared wisely, not withdrawn.

Among his most significant initiatives were Chinese and Bahasa Malaysia Sunday Masses. Communities grew in confidence and participation as faith found expression in the language of the heart. Three language Coordinating Committees – English, BM and Chinese – were formed not to divide, but to help the parish breathe together.

His care extended to children and families. He strengthened Sunday School, introduced Children’s Liturgy of the Word, and built a Baptismal font for immersion, restoring fuller sacramental expression.

He welcomed movements of renewal – the Charismatic Renewal, the Neo-Catechumenal Way, and marriage and family ministries – not as programmes to manage, but as pathways into deeper communion. Accompany the people and trust the Spirit to work.

At 60 when many slowed down, he began learning computers, Chinese programmes and digital publishing, producing bulletins in English, Chinese and BM. Communication was renewed through redesigned three-language bulletins and the column “Word and I”, turning announcements into catechesis and readers into participants.

The parish landscape evolved in service of faith. The once-criticised hillside Grotto became a beloved prayer space, especially during the Feast of the Assumption, when outdoor Eucharistic celebrations allowed theology to breathe under open skies.

The parish also grew outward: a kindergarten in 1990; St Mark’s Church and the St Joseph’s Multi-Purpose Hall in 1993; St Paul’s Church in Ulu Dusun in 1995. He opened the Sibuga Cemetery, renovated St Joseph’s for its Silver Jubilee, and relocated St Mary’s Bandar and St Mary’s Convent schools in 1998 – securing facilities for future generations.

Yet parishioners remember most not what he built, but how he related. He invited them for coffee, listened patiently, encouraged generously, offered advice gently and affirmed quietly. Leadership, for him, was exercised as much in conversations as in councils.

Throughout these 15 years at St Mary’s – the longest chapter of his missionary life – he led steadily. He trusted people, respected culture and language, formed faith patiently, and built only what served pastoral life. When he was transferred to St Peter’s Parish, Kudat on November 24, 1999, St Mary’s did not simply lose a rector. It released a shepherd who had taught the parish how to walk together.

Fr Tobias once described parish growth as young plants sprouting after rainfall. And perhaps that is the best image of him. He was not the plant, nor the fruit, but the rain. And to those who walk after him, his life leaves a simple lesson: “no preparation, no celebration” and perhaps also this: no surrender, no peace. What he left behind was more than buildings or programmes. He left something rarer – a parish formed by preparation, rooted in communion and taught how to celebrate.

Different callings, one priesthood and one human heart

In an era tempted by speed, scale and efficiency, Fr Tobias’ yesteryears at St Mary’s offer a quieter, more demanding lesson: parishes grow deepest not when pastors impress, but when they stay long enough to know their people and love them well.

It would not be honest to suggest that his long ministry was without moments of tension or hurt. Strong convictions and high standards can leave bruises, especially in the close and demanding spaces of parish life. We are all human – priests included – and some who worked with him experienced strain. Yet, with time, what endures is not the difficulty, but the sincerity of his intention: a priest who sought the good of the Church above himself and continuing the journey for the greater glory of God.

Fr Tobias’ story does not end in remembrance; it confronts us as a question within today’s demanding realities of parish life. Amid declining vocations, a shortage of priests, expanding demands and the daily struggles of the faithful, a difficult question quietly surfaces: are diocesan priests still able, amid real constraints, to offer the depth and continuity of pastoral care their vocation calls for? Or has responsibility, often out of necessity, shifted toward structures and committees, sometimes at the cost of closeness to the people they are meant to shepherd?

This is a question for discernment. All priests share one priesthood, but not the same calling. Religious and missionary priests are formed by charism and mission. Diocesan priests are called differently. They belong not to a charism, but to people and place. The parish is not an assignment; it is home. The faithful are not a ministry group; they are their people.

That is why pastoral care is fundamental to the diocesan priesthood. He is called to stay: to preside at the font where life begins, to stand at the altar where grace is shared, to listen in reconciliation, to bless unions, comfort the grieving and commend the dead to God. He walks with families across generations, knowing their stories and silences.

Hidden cost of pastoral fidelity

And yet, here lies the other truth we must name honestly. The priests are stretched thin. They carry on as pastor, counsellor, administrator and spiritual father – often all at once. But behind the collar is a human heart. Priests feel. Priests suffer. And sometimes, priests break.

A parishioner, Raymond Jim, recalled a line from Fr Tobias that landed heavily: “Priests have no time to cry.” On the surface, it sounded almost dry, even wry. Beneath it lay the hidden cost of pastoral life – the grief absorbed daily, the burdens carried quietly, the need to keep going because others depend on you.

Recent tragedies in the global Church, including the deaths of young priests under immense pressure, remind us that the emotional and spiritual weight of ministry is often borne in silence. As one priest wrote: “Inside every priest there is a human heart. Yes, God is our strength. But we are made of flesh and blood.” Cassocks can hide wounds – loneliness, fatigue, spiritual dryness, the burden of carrying many while having few to carry them.

So how do we hold both truths? Not by asking priests to do more, but by becoming clearer about what truly matters. Delegation has its place. Lay leadership is indispensable. But delegation must never become abdication. Administration can be shared. Pastoral presence cannot be outsourced.

At the same time, pastoral care cannot be sustained on exhaustion alone. Priests need space to rest without guilt, silence without suspicion, renewal without shame. Jesus Himself withdrew to pray. He slept. He asked His friends to stay with Him.

A vocation is not strengthened by denying humanity. It is sanctified by caring for it. Parishes, too, must rediscover community. Priesthood was never meant to be a solo endurance test. It is a shared journey with the People of God.

Home at last: In gratitude to the exiled shepherds

Fr Tobias celebrated his Golden Jubilee of priesthood on August 14, 2004, marking 50 years of faithful service at the altar and among the people he loved. He became the first resident of Vianney Home for retired priests. There, he entered a quieter season of priestly life marked by prayer and presence.

In his final months, illness confined him to his bed. He slipped quietly into a coma and died peacefully on September 11, 2010, at the age of 86. As Sharon Ho later recalled, on the following morning the Church proclaimed a Responsorial Psalm of rare and tender fittingness: “I will leave this place and go to my Father.” It was not planned. It did not need to be. It simply was a final benediction, spoken without words.

At his Requiem Mass in St Mary’s Cathedral, Sandakan, fellow priests spoke of a man of solid faith – fatherly, understanding, accommodating, deeply attentive to the needs of his people. When I spoke with many parishioners who had known Fr Tobias, their gratitude was often accompanied by tears of remembrance. It was a small but telling sign of how deeply he had been cherished.

A life that had journeyed from China to exile with other China priests, from loneliness to mission, from parish to parish across Sabah, now completed its final passage with the same quiet trust that had marked his priesthood. Not in noise. Not in spectacle. But in peace. And so we take comfort in believing that Fr Tobias has indeed returned to the Father he served so faithfully – received not as a stranger, but as a son who has come home.

In remembering him, we also remember a generation of China-born priests whose lives were shaped by displacement and whose faith was forged in exile. They came without certainty, without familiarity, without applause. They learned new languages, endured loneliness, built parishes from little, and stayed long enough to become fathers to a people not their own. Sabah’s Church was not only served by them – it was quietly formed by them.

The Church does not need priests who burn brightly and briefly. It needs shepherds who can remain – rooted, patient, fully human, fully alive. And perhaps that is the enduring lesson of those exiled priests who came to Sabah, and of Fr Tobias in particular: that faith grows deepest not where pastors arrive impressively, but where they choose, quietly and faithfully, to stay.

As one parishioner, Jacqueline Chu, summed Fr Tobias Chi up simply: a warm smile, a big heart, ever-available, deeply fatherly, human, visionary and ahead of his time – a priest who shaped lives while never ceasing to learn.