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About this place
Gyodong Mission Station belongs to Hajeom Parish in the Diocese of Incheon and serves the Catholic community of Gyodong Island in Ganghwa County. Its story is closely tied to the history of displaced people who settled on the island after the Korean War, and it has provided a nearby place where island residents, far from a parish church, could continue Mass, prayer, and community life.
Because Gyodong is a border island from which North Korea can be seen at close range, the meaning of the mission station is inseparable from the local experience of national division. It preserves the memory of a Catholic community formed by refugees from Hwanghae Province and of island residents and missionary priests who sustained the community over many years. Today it remains a mission station linked with Hajeom Parish and a place that expresses the Catholic memory of Gyodong amid war, separation, and continued faith.
History & origins
The origins of Gyodong Mission Station are connected with Catholics who fled from Yeonbaek County in Hwanghae Province, Kaesong, and other northern areas during the Korean War. Unable to return home, the refugees settled on Gyodong Island and formed a Catholic community by gathering for mission-station prayer services. On the basis of this community, Gyodong Mission Station was established in 1958 under Ganghwa Parish.
As the parish structure of the Ganghwa area later developed, the mission station eventually became part of Hajeom Parish. In the particular geography of a border island, the mission station was more than a place for Mass: it became a center where displaced Catholics could preserve both community ties and faith. This background explains why Gyodong's history belongs both to the history of national division and to local Catholic history.
From 2005, retired Maryknoll missionary Fr. Robert R. Pellini continued pastoral service at Gyodong Mission Station and cared for the community for many years. He celebrated his final Mass there on April 30, 2024, and after a farewell Mass at Hajeom Church in May, concluded his long missionary service in Korea.
The history of Gyodong Mission Station therefore brings together a faith community formed by wartime refugees, its establishment as a mission station in 1958, the persistence of Catholic life on a border island, and the long pastoral presence of a missionary priest. The present mission station preserves these multiple layers of memory in one place.
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Building information
- Passenger elevators: 0
- 1 above-ground floors · 0 below-ground floors
- Approved for use in 1971
- Total floor area: 144㎡
Building-register record · · Source
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Sources and updates
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- 한국천주교주교회의 온라인 주소록
Diocese
Incheon Diocese (Diocese of Incheon)
Official website: http://www.caincheon.or.kr
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