Pyeongchon Catholic Church

History & origins

As the population of the Pyeongchon area grew rapidly with New Town development in the 1990s, the existing parishes could no longer easily accommodate the expanding Catholic community. According to the Diocese of Suwon, Pyeongchon Parish was established on January 20, 1995, after being separated from the territories of Hogye-dong and Bisan-dong parishes.

After its establishment, the community worked toward securing an independent church, and the new church was dedicated on October 3, 1997. Growth did not stop there. As the Catholic population centered on Pyeongchon continued to expand, Beomgye Parish was separated from Pyeongchon in 1998, followed by Beolmal Parish in 2003.

This chronology shows that Pyeongchon was more than a single parish founded in a new town: it became part of the wider reorganization of Catholic communities in Anyang as the city expanded after the 1990s. In 2020 the parish celebrated the 25th anniversary of its establishment with a commemorative Mass, looking back on a generation of parish life while preparing for the years ahead.

The newly independent parishes went on to form their own local communities, while Pyeongchon remained one of the mother parishes from which that growth had emerged. Its history is therefore not only the story of erecting one church building, but also a history of the local Church adapting its pastoral boundaries to urban development and allowing expanding communities of the faithful to take root as distinct parishes. In particular, the separation of Beomgye and Beolmal shows that, after Pyeongchon itself had grown, it in turn gave rise to neighboring independent communities. The changing parish boundaries were therefore more than an administrative adjustment; they were a pastoral response intended to provide closer parish communities as the number and living patterns of the faithful changed.