Cathedral of the Sacred Heart of Chiang Mai
Next to the Ping River, in Chiang Mai, the Cathedral of the Sacred Heart, the seat of the Catholic diocese of northern Thailand, rises. The first church was erected in 1931 as a mission post, and the present temple, third in the series, was opened on 30 October 1999.
🌹 Wonders and anecdotes
- The first missionary attempt came from far away: the parents Grandjean and Vachal of the Foreign Missions of Paris reached Chiang Mai on January 18, 1844 after forty-five days of journey, although that first seed did not come to take root.
- On January 18, 1931, the exact date of that first missionary landing, Father George Mirabel and Thai priest Nicolás Bunkerd Kitbamrung arrived, and that same year the first church of the Sacred Heart was built.
- Father Nicolás Bunkerd, co-founder of the mission, died in prison in 1944 after having catechized and baptized 68 fellow prisoners; he was beatified by John Paul II in 2000, the first recognized martyr of Thailand.
- The parish was raised to apostolic prefecture in 1959 and to diocese in 1965 by St. Paul VI; in this diocese the Virgin also has a house: the church of Our Lady of Lourdes of Lampang, in the neighbouring province.
Sacred Heart of Jesus
The Cathedral of the Sacred Heart is home to almost a century of Catholic faith in northern Thailand, born from the tendon of the missionaries of 1931 and governed by the martyrdom of Blessed Nicholas Bunkord Kitbamrung. Today she is the mother of dozens of parishes and hundreds of village chapels between the mountains.
In you I trust; Mother of the Lord, pray for the Church of Chiang Mai.
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