Founder of PUSKAT Keningau dies at 84

PENAMPANG – Mill Hill Missionary Father Georg Bauer, founder of PUSKAT Keningau in October 1966, died in Haus fur Senioren in Absam Germany. He was 84.

Born in 1932 in Gaindorf/Vilsbiburg (Bavaria), Georg was the son of Joseph and Maria Zehenbauer.  He had five brothers and seven sisters.  He did his secondary studies in the diocesan minor seminary at Straubing near Regensburg and his philosophy in Brixen.  He entered St Joseph’s College Mill Hill in September 1951.  He took his perpetual oath on 5 May 1954 and was ordained a missionary priest on 10 July 1955.  He celebrated his diamond jubilee in 2015.

Almost immediately after his ordination he was sent to Jesselton North Borneo (now Kota Kinabalu Sabah).  He was a pastoral priest with a great interest in the catechists.  In October 1966, Georg inaugurated a three-month catechetical course in PUSKAT Keningau with four participants: Stephen Titing (Tulid), Aloysius Angkabun (Pensiangan), Josue Kating (Keningau), and Blasius Gahim (Toboh Laut).  This course has been modified through the years but is still going strong under the Keningau Diocese.  He left Sabah in the 1970s.

From 1981 to 1983 he worked in the Diocese of St Louis in the North American Region.  In 1983 he was sent to Kenya where he served for ten years in the parish of Oriang.  In 1993 he was sent to the German Speaking Region but returned to Kenya in 1994.  Ill-health forced him to return to the German Speaking Region in 1996.  For the next twelve years he served the people of Pleiskirchen including the small parishes of Wald and Nonnberg in the Diocese of Passau.  In 2008 he retired to St Josefs Missionshaus in Absam.  He was admitted to the “Haus fur Senioren” in Absam in January 2015.  In the last three weeks his health deteriorated rapidly and he died peacefully on 15 June 2016 at 1:00 pm.  He was buried in Absam on June 18.