Yupori Mission Station

History & origins

Yupori Mission Station took shape after a new parish had been established in the Geumwang area. A history of the mission station reported by the Catholic Peace Newspaper records that after Mugeuk Parish, today's Geumwang Parish, was established in 1957, its first pastor, Father Raymund Obarowski, repaired an empty family house and established Yupori Mission Station in 1959. A basic survey of Catholic heritage by Chungcheongbuk-do likewise records 1959 as the year of its establishment.

After the community had taken root, a mission-station building was constructed and dedicated in May 1970. The provincial survey of Catholic architectural heritage also gives 1970 as the construction year, corroborating this chronology. The development shows how a faith community that began in a renovated private house came to secure a dedicated place of its own.

When Maengdong Parish was established in 2010, Yupori Mission Station came under the pastoral care of the new parish, and the mission-station community continued thereafter. Its continuity is visible today in Maengdong Parish's liturgical schedule, which regularly includes Mass at Yupori. The history of Yupori Mission Station thus runs from missionary work in the Geumwang area, through the establishment of its own chapel, to the persistence of the local faith community despite a change in parish jurisdiction.