Located in the far southern Hebei Province and under the jurisdiction of Handan City, Daming County is home to the Mother of Grace Cathedral and a Roman Catholic diocese. Compared to its well-known Catholic connections, the history of Protestant Christianity in Daming is known to few.
Daming is located in the Southeast of Handan city, near the border between Hebei Province, Henan Province, and Shandong Province. As a secondary capital in the Northern Song Dynasty, Daming boasts a rich historical and cultural heritage.
Christianity was first introduced to Daming in 1897. The earliest mission societies to enter the county include South Zhili Mission (non-denominational, 1904), Church of the Nazarene, the Mennonite Mission and, Bethel Mission. Among them, the South Zhili Mission was the first one to enter it, while the Church of the Nazarene and the Mennonites had larger scales. Apart from these four missions, whose missionaries were mostly from the United States, there was also an indigenous church sending out local missionaries.
During the time of the Republic of China, the evangelism mission reached its peak. Apart from evangelizing and planting churches, the missionaries also built schools, hospitals, orphanages, farms and roads, making a great influence in the local education, transport, medicine, charity, and other social undertakings.
Among many other churches built by foreign missionaries, the former Mennonite church building, which is located on the East side of South Street, is now still serving as a Christian church. The church was built under the leadership of American missionary Peter J. Boehr and was put into use in 1927. Its main hall could host nearly 1000 people.
After the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, the church was converted into a theatre and later a cinema, thus the interior setting was changed greatly. The church building was returned back to Christians in 1992, and it underwent a major refurbishment in 2019 by the church members, with many of its original features restored.
Built in 1918, Daming’s Mother of Grace Cathedral was the second-largest cathedral at the time, equally famous as the St. Ignatius Cathedral in Shanghai. It served as the headquarters of the Diocese of Daming.
- Translated by Grace Song
