Nambang Jesungji

Overview

The Nambangje Shrine is a shrine belonging to the Diocese of Daejeon, located in Namseong-ri, Sinchang-myeon, Asan-si, Chungcheongnam-do. Good News introduces it as a “village of believers where countless faithful kept their faith unto death in the era of persecution.” It is the spiritual hometown where Saint Peter Cho Hwa-seo and Saint Joseph Cho Yun-ho, father and son who were martyred in Jeonju during the Byeongin Persecution, lived for a long time.

History

According to a travel article on the Chungcheongnam-do website, the name Nambangje is said to derive from the Nambangje, that is, the Nambangje reservoir, in what is now Sinchang Namseong-ri (the area around Namseong-ri 205-1 and 476-6). The same article says that the seeds of the Gospel were sown in this area before the Sinhae Persecution in 1791, and that Catholic faith communities were formed in the former Daeseo-myeon area (the area from Sindong to Sinseong-ri, Seonjang-myeon, present-day Asan-si), Nambangje in Namseong-ri, Sinchang-myeon, and Yongdang-ri and Daehung-ri in Gasan-ri, Seongjang-myeon. After the Gihae Persecution in 1839, it was transformed into a village of believers, a secret faith community of believers, and the faith community of Changmal also later became a village of believers. Many martyrs emerged during the Byeongin Persecution in 1866, and the same article names Saint Peter Cho Hwa-seo and Joseph Cho Yun-ho, John Kang, Jung-sim Kwon, Seon-yang Go, and the married couple Philip Kim and Maria Park as martyrs. Nambangje is also the hometown where Father Augustine Jeong Gyu-ha, the fourth Korean priest of the Korean Catholic Church, was born.

According to a shrine introduction published in the Seoul Senatus (“Pilgrimage to Korean Catholic Shrines” (2019), citing the Daejeon Bulletin), Peter Cho Hwa-seo was born and raised in Domaji, Suwon in 1815, but when his father Andrew Cho was martyred during the Gihae Persecution in 1839, he moved to Sinchang with his widowed mother, where his son Joseph Cho Yun-ho was born and they lived together. From around 1850, he assisted missionary work as copyist and coachman for Father Thomas Choe Yang-eop, escorting him to villages of believers throughout the country. During the Gyeongsin Persecution in 1860, Father Choe Yang-eop was seized by runners but escaped, completed a pastoral visit to the southern part of Gyeongsang-do, and then, on his way to report to Bishop Berneux, became critically ill from overwork and typhoid; Cho Hwa-seo informed Father Pourthie and helped him receive the Anointing of the Sick.

After Father Choe died, in 1864 Cho Hwa-seo led his family to settle in Seongji-dong, Soyang-myeon, Jeonju, where they farmed. On the evening of December 5, 1866, he was arrested by runners and dragged to the Jeolla provincial office, and despite threats and demands to apostatize from the governor of Jeolla, he answered, “Though I die and disappear in this world, after death I shall at once go to a new world and live.” He was martyred at Supjeongi in Jeonju on December 13, 1866, after receiving three sword strokes. His son Joseph Cho Yun-ho refused his father’s advice to flee far away and was arrested and transported together with him, and did not yield to the governor and runners who urged apostasy. When he did not die even after being beaten with clubs at the execution ground, the runners had beggars hang him at Seocheon Bridge, and, as the law did not execute father and son on the same day, his son was martyred at Seocheon Bridge in Jeonju on December 23. The two were canonized on May 6 by the pope who visited Korea in 1984, John Paul 2.

Architecture and Space

The Seoul Senatus introduces the Nambangje Shrine as a shrine small enough to see the whole at a glance, surrounded by a light-green steel fence. In the center of the shrine, behind the altar, stands a cone-shaped sculpture. At the top, together with a pine tree in the shape of a cross, Saint Peter Cho Hwa-seo and Saint Joseph Cho Yun-ho are depicted standing, and the martyrs climbing the steps from below are 36 martyrs from the Sinchang area, including Nambangje. The conical form is said to symbolize a pure and abstract ascent toward the Holy Spirit. On the lower tier of the sculpture is engraved a verse from the Te Deum of Saint Ambrose: “The dazzling host of martyrs praises God the Father on high.”

Stations of the Cross sculptures have been installed around the shrine, each station divided into an upper and a lower tier, expressed with traditional Korean figures and costumes, and also depicting the ways in which the Korean martyrs were martyred. The travel article on the Chungcheongnam-do website notes that the shrine has a statue of the Virgin Mary, a guide notice and guest book, a shrine pilgrimage stamp, a small parking lot and restrooms, and that its supervising church is the Onyang Sinjeong-dong Church.

Related Places and People

• Saint Peter Cho Hwa-seo: the saint martyred at Supjeongi in Jeonju on December 13, 1866.
• Saint Joseph Cho Yun-ho: the saint martyred at Seocheon Bridge in Jeonju on December 23, 1866.
• Father Augustine Jeong Gyu-ha: the fourth Korean priest of the Korean Catholic Church, from Nambangje.
• Onyang Sinjeong-dong Church: the church in charge of the shrine.

References and Sources

1. Chungcheongnam-do website, “Pilgrimage to Shrines in Asan, Chungnam: Nambangje Shrine, a shrine beautiful with roses.” Confirmation of place-name origin, formation of the village of believers, martyrs, shrine facilities and supervising church.
   https://www.chungnam.go.kr/cnportal/media/article/view.do?articleNo=MD0001836418&menuNo=500167&pageIndex=
2. Seoul Senatus, “Nambangje.” Confirmation of shrine sculptures and Stations of the Cross, and the life and martyrdom of father and son Cho Hwa-seo and Cho Yun-ho.
   http://senatus.or.kr/?p=14819
3. Good News (Archdiocese of Seoul), Shrines and Historic Sites “Nambangje.” Confirmation of affiliated diocese and shrine overview.
   https://m.catholic.or.kr/web/holyplace/?seq=4397