Indonesian president Soeharto on 2 November 1988 officially inaugurated Dili's new Catholic cathedral, reportedly the largest in Southeast Asia.

The ceremony was attended by Dili's apostolic administrator, Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo.

[5] On 1 March 2007 the country's new apostolic nuncio, Archbishop Leopoldo Girelli, celebrated Mass at the cathedral and then visited camps for displaced people in and around the capital, and the Seminary of Our Lady of Fatima.

[6] On 27 April 2002 around 2,000 people gathered at the cathedral for the arrival from Portugal of a statue of Our Lady of Fatima, which was to go on tour for three weeks as part of the celebrations ahead of the country’s independence.

[7] The two Catholic bishops of East Timor and the papal nuncio to the country jointly urged people to end a prolonged spate of violence and pray for national reconciliation and peace, after Mass on 4 March 2007 at Immaculate Conception Cathedral.