Geumgwang-ri Mission Station

History & origins

The Catholic community around Geumgwang-ri is connected with the settlement of believers who fled into the Yeongdong region after the Byeongin Persecution. A 1923 record by Bishop Devred and a 1921 article in Gyeonghyang Magazine, both cited by the Diocese of Chuncheon, describe how Catholics from Jeolla, Chungcheong, and Gyeonggi crossed into Yeongdong to escape persecution and formed Catholic villages. The current diocesan mission-station registry gives 1887 as the establishment year of Geumgwang-ri Mission Station.

Geumgwang-ri appears clearly in Church statistics in an 1890 report by Fr. Le Merre of Pungsuwon Parish, and an 1893 year-end report by Fr. Chargeboeuf described it as a pottery-making village. By around 1900 the community had roughly one hundred Catholics and had, in addition to the house used as a mission station, a separate place used when missionaries visited. This shows that Geumgwang-ri had developed beyond a small cluster of believers into a relatively stable Catholic community.

In 1921 Fr. Lee Cheol-yeon settled at Geumgwang-ri and the place became a parish. Records from 1922 show that it had jurisdiction over several mission stations, including Gyeonbul in Yangyang, Jebigol in Gujeong-myeon, Oilgol in Okgye, and Neurat in Jeongseon. Although later changes in the parish structure left Geumgwang-ri again as a mission station, its early history of faith and its role as a center of evangelization have led the Diocese of Chuncheon to continue treating it as an important historic place.