Eomjeong Church

History & origins

The Catholic community in the Umjeong area began as a mission station long before a parish was established. According to the Digital Chungju Culture Encyclopedia’s account of Umjeong Catholic Church, in 1958 Teresa Han from Gyohyeon-dong Catholic Church stayed in Minae-ri, Umjeong-myeon, carried out evangelization, and purchased a house for use as a mission station. In 1964 a mission-station building was completed at the present location, giving local Catholics a more stable place to gather regularly.

After Mokhaeng-dong Parish was established in 1971, Umjeong-myeon was included in its pastoral territory. The Korean Catholic Encyclopedia’s entry on Mokhaeng-dong Parish lists Umjeong as one of its six mission stations and, in material from the 1990s, refers to it as one of the larger mission communities. These records show that for many years the Umjeong community continued its Catholic life not as an independent parish but as a mission station of Mokhaeng-dong Parish.

According to the official records of the Diocese of Cheongju, Umjeong Parish was established on August 17, 2010. The mission community that had begun in the 1950s thus sustained the faith of local Catholics for decades before taking shape as an independent parish. The history of Umjeong Catholic Church illustrates how a small rural mission station could endure over a long period and, as pastoral needs and the community developed, eventually become a parish. Today’s parish stands on the accumulated history of that earlier mission-station community.