Daejeon Diocesan Office Shrine of Our Lady Pilgrimage Site

History & origins

The Marian Grotto Pilgrimage Site developed in connection with the relocation of the Diocese of Daejeon's curia from Daejeon to Sejong. Construction of the new diocesan offices began in 2019 and was completed at the end of 2020, and diocesan operations moved to Sejong in 2021. The diocese intended the new complex to be more than an administrative facility, envisioning it as a place open to the faithful and the wider community and including a prayer site that would express the spiritual identity of the local Church.

The Marian grotto was blessed on 26 March 2021. It was dedicated to Our Lady of Lourdes, the diocese's first patroness, and was given the spiritual invitation to “repent and pray.” The design includes representations of St. Andrew Kim Taegon, St. Bishop Antoine Daveluy and other martyrs, together with Venerable Thomas Choe Yang-eop. A relic of St. Andrew Kim was placed in the altar, and the ensemble was designed to hold together the memory of martyrdom and the future mission of evangelization.

The new diocesan curia was formally dedicated on 31 May 2022. Since then, the Marian grotto has served not only for personal prayer by visitors but also for diocesan prayer and liturgical gatherings, giving the administrative complex a distinctive connection with pilgrimage. Devotion to the diocese's first patroness, the martyr heritage of the Naepo region, and the pastoral vision of the new curia are thus brought together in this relatively small sacred space.