The church has launched a last-ditch effort to raise enough capital for the 4000-niche columbarium, with the cut-off date set as November.

The plans were unveiled late last year to attract subscriptions to bring the design to fruition, but the church rector Father Chris Butterworth said the response had been surprisingly slow.

“We’re now six months along and there has been a slow response,” Father Butterworth said.

“We only have $70,000 and we need about $180,000 to start stage one, so we are well and truly behind. If we don’t raise the capital then we can’t build the columbarium.”

As part of the plan the existing columbarium – with 404 niches – will be removed and incorporated into the new memorial feature. 

The original columbarium dates back to the 1950s.

Father Butterworth said the columbarium would also accommodate Maitland’s growing population.

“I’ve been a little bit surprised by the response but I think there are a lot of people sitting on their hands waiting for the columbarium to be built, but they don’t realise that if they don’t put their hand up and make a donation then this won’t happen at all,” he said.

“This will mean that the old wall that is need of repair will be slapped with some sort of Band-Aid solution and the lovely design we had planned just won’t go ahead.”

Father Butterworth said statistics showed that more people were cremated than buried.

“We started planning for this back in 2009, so it has been a long drawn out process to get to this point,” he said.

“It would be a real shame if it didn’t go ahead but we don’t want this to be a weeping sore that goes on forever.

“I think a lot of people, especially the older Maitland identities, would love to have their ashes at St Mary’s, but if we can’t get the columbarium up then that won’t be a possibility.”

All money will be refunded – niches are $1500 each – if the columbarium doesn’t go ahead.