Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Seoul

Archdiocese of Seoul Archidioecesis Seulensis 서울대교구
Cathedral of the Virgin Mary of the Immaculate Conception (Mother church)
Location
Country	South Korea
Territory	Seoul, Hwanghae Province
Ecclesiastical province	Seoul
Statistics
Area	17,349 km2 (6,698 sq mi)
Population - Total - Catholics	(as of 2017) 10,181,166 1,030,862 (15.07%)
Parishes	232
Information
Denomination	Catholic
Sui iuris church	Latin Church
Rite	Roman Rite
Established	September 9, 1831 (as Apostolic Vicariate) March 10, 1962 (as Archdiocese)
Cathedral	Cathedral of the Blessed Virgin Mary of the Immaculate Conception in Seoul
Patron saint	Blessed Virgin Mary
Current leadership
Pope	Francis
Archbishop	Andrew Yeom Sou-jeong
Auxiliary Bishops	Basil Cho Kyu-man Timothy Yu Gyoung-chon Peter Chung Soon-taek Benedictus Son Hee-Song Job Koo Yobi
Bishops emeritus	Nicolas Cheong Jin-suk
Map
Website
aos.catholic.or.kr

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Seoul (Latin: Archidioecesis Seulensis, Korean: 서울대교구) is a Metropolitan archdiocese of the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic Church comprising the metropolitan area of Seoul, South Korea, whose province comprises parts of South Korea (which has two more provinces) and all North Korea, yet depends on the missionary Roman Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples.

Its Metropolitan bishop as the Archbishop of Seoul resides at his Myeongdong Cathedral in Jung-gu, Seoul. The Archbishop of Seoul is also the Apostolic Administrator of the Diocese of Pyongyang in North Korea. As the episcopal see is the oldest one in Korea and that of its capital city, he is often considered to be so called the Primate of Korea, though the official title has not been expressly granted by the Holy See by canonical decree.

There are 57 Catholic secretly active parishes in North Korea, but due to the current regime in place, no Catholic priests are permitted permanent residency at current time.

Statistics

As per 2014, it pastorally served 1,472,815 Catholics (14.5% of 10,143,645 total) on 17,349 km² in 229 parishes and 183 missions with 908 priests (683 diocesan, 225 religious), 2,282 religious (445 brothers, 1,837 sisters) and 266 seminarians.

List of territorial losses

Pope Leo XIII was the first to approve to separate the community from the control of diocese of Beijing and assigned priests from the Paris Foreign Missions Society but never went due to the Anti-Christian sentiment and persecutions during that time.

• Pope Gregory XVI granted a Papal bull declaring it as an official See on 9 September 1831, referring to it as the Apostolic Vicariate of Korea 조선 / Corea (Curiate Italian) / 朝鮮 (正體中文), on territory split off from the then Diocese of Peking, of what used to be part of Imperial China.
• It was renamed on 8 April 1911 as Apostolic Vicariate of Seoul 서울 / 漢城 (正體中文), when it also lost territory to establish the Apostolic Vicariate of Taiku (Daegu).
• It lost more territories, beginning on 8 May 1920 to establish the Apostolic Vicariate of Wonsan
• On 17 March 1927, it lost again to establish the Apostolic Prefecture of Hpyeng-yang
• On 25 April 1939, it lost again to establish the Apostolic Prefecture of Shunsen.
• It was again officially renamed on 12 July 1950 after its See as Apostolic Vicariate of Seul.
• It lost territories again on 23 June 1958 to establish the Apostolic Vicariate of Cheongju and the Apostolic Vicariate of Daijeon,
• On 6 June 1961, it lost again to make the Apostolic Vicariate of Incheon, all three now have Suffragan bishops.
• The diocese was raised to the level of Metropolitan Archdiocese on 10 March 1962.
• It lost again on 7 October 1963 to establish the Roman Catholic Diocese of Suwon
• It lost again on 24 June 2004 to establish the Roman Catholic Diocese of Uijeongbu, now both its suffragans.

The diocese has received two official Papal visits from Pope John Paul II in May 1984 and October 1989 and from Pope Francis in August 2014.

Ecclesiastical province

The Metropolitan's ecclesiastical province comprises his own Archdiocese and the following suffragan bishoprics, mostly in South Korea :

• Roman Catholic Diocese of Chuncheon 춘천
• Roman Catholic Diocese of Daejeon 대전
• Roman Catholic Diocese of Hamhung 함흥 (in North Korea)
• Roman Catholic Diocese of Incheon 인천
• Roman Catholic Diocese of Pyongyang 평양 (in North Korea)
• Roman Catholic Diocese of Suwon 수원
• Roman Catholic Diocese of Uijeongbu 의정부
• Roman Catholic Diocese of Wonju 원주

Leadership

Ordinaries

Apostolic Vicars of Korea

• Barthélemy Bruguière, M.E.P. (1831–1835)
• Saint Laurent-Joseph-Marius Imbert, M.E.P. (1836–1839)
• Jean-Joseph-Jean-Baptiste Ferréol, M.E.P. (1843–1853)
• Saint Siméon-François Berneux, M.E.P. (1854–1866)
• Saint Antoine-Marie-Nicolas Daveluy, M.E.P. (1866)
• Félix-Clair Ridel, M.E.P. (1869–1884)
• Marie-Jean-Gustave Blanc, M.E.P. (1884–1890)
• Gustave-Charles-Marie Mutel, M.E.P. (1890–1911)

Apostolic Vicars of Seoul

• Gustave-Charles-Marie Mutel, M.E.P. (1911–1933), appointed Archbishop (personal title) in 1926
• Adrien-Joseph Larribeau, M.E.P. (1933–1942), appointed Apostolic Vicar and later Bishop of Daijeon
• Paul Roh Ki-nam (1942–1962)

Archbishops of Seoul

• Paul Roh Ki-nam (1962–1967)
• Victorinus Youn Kong-hi (1967–1968; apostolic administrator)
• Cardinal Stephen Kim Sou-hwan (1968–1998)
• Cardinal Nicholas Cheong Jin-suk (1998–2012)
• Cardinal Andrew Yeom Sou-jeong (2012–present)

Coadjutor Bishops

• Jean-Joseph-Jean-Baptiste Ferréol, M.E.P. (1838–1843)
• Saint Siméon-François Berneux, M.E.P. (1844–1854)
• Saint Antoine-Marie-Nicolas Daveluy, M.E.P. (1855–1866)
• Marie-Jean-Gustave Blanc, M.E.P. (1877–1884)
• Émile-Alexandre-Joseph Devred, M.E.P. (1920–1926), never succeeded to see
• Adrien-Joseph Larribeau, M.E.P. (1926–1933)

Auxiliary Bishops

• Joseph Kyeong Kap-ryong (1977–1984), appointed Bishop of Daejeon
• Paul Kim Ok-kyun (1985–2001)
• Peter Kang U-il (1985–2002), appointed Bishop of Cheju
• Andreas Choi Chang-mou (1994–1999), appointed Coadjutor Archbishop and later Archbishop of Gwangju
• Joseph Lee Han-taek (2001–2004), appointed Bishop of Uijeongbu
• Andrew Yeom Sou-jeong (2001–2012), appointed Archbishop of Seoul
• Lucas Kim Woon-hoe (2002–2010), appointed Bishop of Chunchon
• Basil Cho Kyu-man (2006–2016), appointed Bishop of Wonju
• Peter Chung Soon-taek (2014–present)
• Timothy Yu Gyoung-chon (2014–present)
• Benedict Son Hee-song (2015–present)
• Job Koo Yobi (2017–present)

See also

• List of Catholic Dioceses in Korea

Sources and external links

• (in Korean) Official homepage
• GCatholic.org, with Google map – data for all sections