Andrew Kim Taegon

Life and Ministry

Andrew Kim Taegon was born on August 21, 1821, in Solmoe, Chungcheong Province, in the Joseon kingdom of Korea, into a family with an established Catholic heritage; his father, Ignatius Kim Jeseon, was himself martyred for the faith. Christianity had reached Korea largely through lay transmission in the late eighteenth century, arriving without a resident clergy, and the community that formed operated under persistent legal prohibition from the Joseon court, which viewed Catholicism as a subversive foreign ideology incompatible with Neo-Confucian social order. Kim Taegon entered the faith through this embattled community and at approximately fifteen years of age traveled overland to Macao, where he studied at the College Général des Missions Étrangères de Paris. He later moved to Shanghai, where he was ordained to the priesthood on August 17, 1845, by Bishop Jean-Joseph Ferréol of the Paris Foreign Mission Society, becoming the first native-born Korean to receive Catholic ordination. He returned clandestinely to Korea by sea later that year, immediately engaging in missionary work, facilitating the entry of foreign priests through coastal routes, and administering to the Catholic community during a period of intensifying government suppression. His priestly ministry in Korea lasted less than a year before authorities apprehended him. He was arrested in mid-1846 and subjected to prolonged interrogation. He composed a final letter to his community from prison, notable for its pastoral clarity and its exhortation to perseverance. He was executed on September 16, 1846, at age twenty-five. Sources: Donald Baker, 'Korean Spirituality' (University of Hawai'i Press, 2008); James H. Grayson, 'Korea: A Religious History' (RoutledgeCurzon, 2002); Paris Foreign Mission Society archival records.

Circumstances of Death

Andrew Kim Taegon was beheaded on September 16, 1846, at Saenamteo on the banks of the Han River near Seoul, then the capital of the Joseon kingdom. He was twenty-five years old. His execution was carried out under orders from the court of King Heonjong as part of the Byeongo Persecution, a systematic effort to suppress Korean Catholicism. He was among a group of Catholics executed during this period. Beheading was the standard method of capital punishment applied to condemned Catholics in this era of Joseon persecution.

Legacy

Andrew Kim Taegon was beatified in 1925 under Pope Pius XI as part of a group of Korean martyrs. He was canonized on May 6, 1984, by Pope John Paul II in Seoul as one of the 103 Korean Martyrs, in a ceremony notable for taking place on Korean soil rather than in Rome. He is recognized as the patron saint of the clergy of Korea. His feast day is September 20, shared with the other 103 Korean Martyrs. Numerous parishes, schools, and institutions in Korea and among the Korean diaspora bear his name.