Rev. Owen McPolin((임 오엔)) SSC. MA, STL, (1889–1963) was an Irish priest who served on missions to China and Korea.

Biography

Born in

Hilltown, County Down Hilltown is a small village within the townland of Carcullion in County Down, Northern Ireland. Hilltown is the main village of the parish of Clonduff which contains the village and the rural areas around it at one end, and the rural enclave of ...

, Ireland, in 1889, McPolin, went to

Maynooth College St Patrick's Pontifical University, Maynooth ( ga, Coláiste Naoimh Phádraig, Maigh Nuad), is the "National Seminary for Ireland" (a Roman Catholic college), and a pontifical university, located in the town of Maynooth, from Dublin, Ireland. ...

where he was ordained in 1913 for the Diocese of Dromore, and became a professor at the Maynooth, in 1919 he joined the

Maynooth Mission to China The Missionary Society of St. Columban ( la, Societas Sancti Columbani pro Missionibus ad Exteros) (abbreviated as S.S.C.M.E. or SSC), commonly known as the Columbans, is a missionary Catholic society of apostolic life of Pontifical Right foun ...

(which became the Columban fathers), and with the founders of the Society Fr. John Blowick and Fr. Edward Galvin, was part of the first mission to China, arriving on the Yawata Maru, Shanghai, in June 1920, and Fr Polin was to serve in China for six years. McPolin was the leader of the first Columban mission to Korea in 1933. Monsignor McPolin served as the Apostolic Prefect in the

Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Gwangju The Catholic Archdiocese of Gwangju ( la, Archidioecesis Kvangiuensis, Hangul: 천주교 광주대교구) is a particular church of the Latin Church of the Catholic Church, one of the three Metropolitan sees of the Catholic Church in Korea. The ...

from 1937 until 1943, he also served as the first Apostolic Administrator of the

Roman Catholic Diocese of Chunchon The Diocese of Chunchon (also romanized ''Chuncheon'' and ''Ch’unch’on'', la, Dioecesis Chuncheonensis) is a diocese of the Latin Church of the Roman Catholic Church in South Korea. A suffragan in the ecclesiastical province of the Metropolit ...

, Korea, from 1939 until 1941. He was placed under house arrest by the Japanese during the Second World war, he served as Apostolic Prefect in the Archdiocese of Gwangju again from 1945 until 1947. From 1948 to his death in 1963 he taught at an American and then at an Irish seminary. A number of Owen McPolin's family served in the church including his uncles, the Very Rev. Murtagh McPolin, P.P., Loughbrickland, Co. Down, and Very Rev. Eugene McPolin, P.P.(1923-1941), St. Colmans' Catholic Church, Kilwarlin, Co. Down. He died in late February 1963.Former Bishops, Archdiocese of Gwangju, http://www.gjcatholic.or.kr/sub/menu1/A0304.aspMissionaries to be remembered in February, Missionary Society of Saint Columban, http://www.columban.or.kr/board03/503

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:McPolin, Owen 1889 births 1963 deaths Alumni of St Patrick's College, Maynooth 20th-century Irish Roman Catholic priests Missionary Society of St. Columban Christian clergy from County Down Irish Roman Catholic missionaries Roman Catholic bishops of Chunchon Roman Catholic bishops of Gwangju Scholars and academics from County Down Academics of St Patrick's College, Maynooth

Biography

See also

References