Danggam Catholic Church

History & origins

Danggam Parish was established in 1978 after being separated from Seomyeon Parish. According to the Seomyeon Parish entry in the Encyclopedia of Korean Catholicism, the records of 267 households and 740 Catholics in the Danggam area were transferred to the new parish when the separation took place. This is a concrete record of part of the Catholic community formerly served by Seomyeon becoming a separate pastoral unit centered on the Danggam living area.

The Catholic population of Danggam grew rapidly after the parish was established. The Encyclopedia records 726 Catholics in 1978, 2,131 in 1983, 3,760 in 1988, and 5,844 in 1994. These figures show that the parish founded in the late 1970s increased substantially in size through the 1980s and early 1990s, and they also help confirm in retrospect the pastoral context in which a separate parish for the Danggam area had become necessary.

There is, however, a discrepancy between sources concerning the exact date of foundation. The Catholic Church directory in Korea gives January 19, 1978, while the Danggam and Seomyeon entries in the Encyclopedia of Korean Catholicism give January 9. The sources agree on the year and on the separation from Seomyeon Parish, but differ on the day, so it is safer not to choose one exact date and instead to use only the shared year 1978 as the basis of the account.

Taken together, the documented history shows Danggam separating from Seomyeon Parish and then becoming established as an independent community while its Catholic population grew substantially over a relatively short period. Although the exact day of foundation remains inconsistent across the sources, the larger sequence—the 1978 separation and the subsequent growth of the parish—is supported by more than one record and forms the historical foundation of the Danggam Catholic community.