Sinbong-dong Church

History & origins

신봉동 Parish was established on September 2, 2008, after separating from Suji Parish in response to the growth of the Catholic population in the Suji area. The new parish took responsibility for all of Sinbong-dong and chose Saint Pierre Aumaître as its patron. In its early years, it built an independent pastoral structure while also facing the long-term task of securing a permanent church of its own.

Construction of the new church began with the groundbreaking on October 31, 2017. The building was designed with one basement level and four floors above ground in a steel and reinforced-concrete structure. After about a year and a half of construction, it was completed on March 31, 2019, providing a larger church and supporting spaces for the growing Catholic population of the area.

On May 12, 2019, Bishop Mathias Lee Yong-hoon presided over the Mass marking the parish’s move into the new church. The bishop and priests from the Diocese of Angoulême in France, with which the parish had formed a sister relationship, also took part. Before the Mass, a statue of Saint Pierre Aumaître was unveiled and blessed at the entrance, visibly linking the Korean parish with the home diocese of its patron saint.

The new church represented more than the completion of a building. It marked the stabilization of an independent community that had developed since the 2008 separation from Suji Parish. At the same time, through the memory of Saint Pierre Aumaître—who ministered in the Songol area and was martyred at Galmaemot—the parish became a place where Korean and French Catholic communities meet through a shared memory of mission and martyrdom. Because more than a decade passed between the establishment of the parish and the completion of the present church, the move-in can be understood as the point at which a newly formed community, after a long period of preparation, gained a stable pastoral base of its own.