Bibong Mission

History & origins

The Catholic community of Rokpyeong-ri in Bibong-myeon is described as having formed around pottery workshops from the period surrounding the persecutions. Diocesan records list it in 1909 as a mission station under the pastoral care of Father Gombert of Geumsari Parish, with 57 Catholics at that time. Pottery production remained one of the community's local livelihoods into the late 1970s.

Mission-station life was interrupted by the Korean War but resumed around 1952. Around 1955, the community president, John Baek Yong-seok, repaired a wooden outbuilding at his home and used it as the mission chapel, allowing worship and community gatherings to continue even without a large dedicated facility.

Over time pottery production declined and ended around 1990, but the memory of both the old kiln sites and the Catholic community remained. Around 2016 the mission station was repaired inside and out, a bell was mounted near the village road, and a statue of the Virgin Mary was installed beneath the eaves.

The history of Bibong Mission Station therefore joins together the life of a persecution-era Catholic village, the pottery trade, interruption and recovery after war, and years of worship in a modest house. The overlap of faith and livelihood within the same rural settlement is one of the defining features of its history.