Christendom NEWS
Here is a brief history of the Catholic Church in Japan, where the SSPX has two Mass centers–one in Tokyo and one in Osaka.
August 2008
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Under the Sign of the Assumption
The first Europeans, Portuguese merchants, arrived in Japan in 1543. In the 16th century, the country was becoming partially united by two successive shoguns: Oda Nobunaga (1534-82), and his lieutenant Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1536-98). During the feudal period (1185-1868), the shogun, "great general who subdues the eastern barbarians," became the practical ruler of Japan. The emperor was stripped of any political power, but remained the head of the traditional religion of Japan, Shintoism, and he was venerated as a descendant of the gods. He was the guardian of traditions.
The history of Japan is a long series of conflicts between lords and of civil wars to obtain the shogunate. The political situation at the time of the missionaries' arrival was favorable to the development of Christianity. The daimyo, local feudal lords, were absolute masters in their domains and jealous of their independence. The daimyo could accept or prescribe in all freedom the Christian religion with no one to contradict them. Moreover, by embracing this religion, they gave themselves greater independence. Through the missionaries they could enter in relations with the heads of foreign states and send or receive embassies. This also explains why Christianity obtained so much success among the territorial nobility, whose example obviously had a strong influence on samurais and on the people.
Catholic missionaries also arrived at the right moment when Buddhism, which had come from China to Japan several centuries ago, was decadent. The immorality of the bonzes was known to all. They were "inclined to sins abhorrent to nature....These bonzes have many boys, sons of noblemen, in their monasteries, whom they teach to read and write, and they commit their abominations with them."[1] People held the leaders of Buddhism in contempt. In contrast, the missionaries edified by their disinterestedness, their morals, and the absolute conformity between their life and their teaching. People ran to them first out of curiosity, which soon turned into real enthusiasm for these strangers who preached the contempt of riches and did not care to acquire any; who preached humility and answered insults with kindness; who preached abstinence and did not get drunk; who preached purity and did not live with women. As they practiced celibacy and occasionally organized pompous ceremonies, they did not shock the traditional Japanese concepts of priest and worship.....Besides, guided by the example and advice left by St. Francis Xavier, they tried to adapt to native customs whenever possible and were extremely careful never to hurt the susceptibilities, so easily aroused, of this people proud and jealous of its independence.
Oda Nobunaga waged war against the Buddhist monasteries and brought the rebels back to obedience. He showed much interest for European culture and was collecting Western artworks, weapons and breastplates. He is one of the first Japanese to have worn Western clothes.
The Beginning of Christendom (1549-51)
The history of Christendom in Japan began with the arrival of St. Francis Xavier in Kagoshima, on the Island of Kyushu, on August 15, 1549, the Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. He was accompanied by Paul of the Holy Faith, John, and Anthony–three Japanese he had met in India who had converted and followed the Spiritual Exercises–as well as by Fr. Cosme de Torres and a young Jesuit Brother, Bro. Juan-Fernandez. He brought with him a cargo of gifts for "the King of Japan" because he wished to be introduced to him as apostolic nuncio.
In a letter, St. Francis Xavier gave details about his arrival in Japan and the beginning of his apostolate:
On the Feast of our Lady in August 1549, God thus brought us to these lands which we had so ardently desired to reach. And since we could find no other harbor in Japan, we sailed to Kagoshima, the land of Paul of the Holy Faith, where we were received with great love by all, both by his relatives and by those who were not.[2]
His first impressions were very favorable, and in the same letter sang the praises of the Japanese people:
The people with whom we have thus far conversed are the best that have as yet been discovered; it seems to me that no other pagan race will be found that will surpass the Japanese. They have, as a race, very fine manners, and they are on the whole good and not malicious.
They have a marvelous sense of honor, and esteem it more than anything else....They are a people of great good will, very sociable, and eager to know.[3]
The first care of St. Francis Xavier was to have the catechism and the explanation of the Creed translated into Japanese. Since most Japanese could read and write, it was important to provide them with Christian literature. A little more than a year later, more than 100 Japanese had converted.
But the bonzes excited the lord of the land against the Christians, and he forbade his subjects to embrace the faith of Christ. Seeing the hostility of the lord, St. Francis Xavier and his companions decided to evangelize other areas of Japan. They left Paul of the Holy Faith in Kagoshima to support and instruct the newly converted Christians.
Fr. de Torres settled in Yamaguchi, a town to the south of the Island of Honshu, the largest of the islands of the Japanese Archipelago. The lord of the place received them with pleasure, and after a few days of preaching, about 100 people had embraced the Faith. St. Francis Xavier evangelized the district of Bungo, in the north-east of the Island of Kyushu. Even though he had received permission to preach and baptize freely, there were few neophytes for lack of an interpreter since he had left the Brother who was fluent in Japanese with Fr. de Torres. Observing that the support of the leaders was a powerful help in converting a people, St. Francis Xavier resolved to meet with the Mikado (the emperor of Japan). He managed to enter the palace, yet he did not meet the Mikado, and gave up his dream to convert him and thus bring the whole Japanese people to Christianity. He came to think that the best solution would be to convert China first, and then the Japanese would follow suit. In November 1551, St. Francis Xavier left Japan, and appointed Fr. Cosme de Torres and a Brother at the head of the young church of about a thousand faithful.
The Golden Age (1551-87)
After the departure of St. Francis Xavier, the golden age of Christianity in Japan began. The churches of Yamaguchi, Bungo, and Hizen–this area corresponds to the present prefectures of Nagasaki and Saga–very soon reached a high degree of prosperity. In the state of Omura,[4] the daimyo Sumitada was baptized in 1563 and had 5,600 Christian subjects. In 1571, threatened by a local rebellion, he launched a military campaign against the bonzes; in 1575, there were no longer any non-Christians in his possessions. The conversion of this daimyo was followed by that of many other Japanese lords, some of whom enjoyed considerable influence. Further north, in Kyoto, where Fr. Vilela had settled in 1579, and in Central Japan the progress of Christianity was no less spectacular. Bonzes, samurais, daimyos, and even kuges (members of the court nobility) converted.
Political troubles interrupted the progress of the Faith between 1564 and 1568. But with the return of peace, Christianity made new progress. Daimyo Oda Nobunaga openly protected Christianity, doubtless for political reasons, in order to counteract the influence of Buddhist monasteries. In 1577, the Jesuits built a beautiful church in Kyoto, which they dedicated to the Assumption of Our Lady. Nobunaga also allowed them to build another church with a school for young boys of the nobility, and a seminary in Azuchi,[5] on Lake Biwa.[6]
In 1581, 22 years after the introduction of Christianity, 75 missionaries were spreading the gospel in Japan, and there were 150,000 Christians. On February 20, 1582, a delegation of four young Japanese, representing three Christian daimyos of Kyushu, sailed for Europe. They had a private audience with Pope Gregory XIII on March 23, 1585. One of them, Julian Nakaura, later became a Jesuit priest and was martyred on the hill of martyrs in Nagasaki on October 21, 1633.
In 1582, Nobunaga was betrayed by one of his generals and committed suicide. His castle in Azuchi was burnt together with the school, the seminary, and the church of the Jesuits. Toyotomi Hideyoshi, one of Nobunaga's lieutenants, seized power and at first showed the same benevolence towards Christians. The Jesuits settled in Osaka, near him, and there they worked famous conversions, among others that of Konishi Yukinaga, Hideyoshi's grand admiral, and of Kuroda Yoshitaka, general of his cavalry.
In 1587 Persecutions Began
In 1587, Toyotomi Hideyoshi decided to expel the Jesuits and took from them the flourishing port of Nagasaki, which had been given them by his predecessor. Besides, he decreed that Christianity was henceforth forbidden. The underground missionaries found it difficult to visit regularly the many thousands of Christians living in Kyushu and part of Honshu. No wonder then that these Christians on various occasions wrote letters and sent messengers to Manila begging the Franciscans to come to Japan. Their letters were addressed in particular to a Franciscan Brother, Gonzalvo Garcia, who had previously spent eight years among the Jesuits as a catechist before joining the Franciscan order in Manila in 1587.
In 1593, Hideyoshi revised his position and gave missionaries a certain freedom, which lasted four years. In December 1596, he believed calumnies told him by some of his governors concerning the missionaries and decreed a new extermination of all missionaries and Christians. On December 30, of that same year, Yakuin, a Christian hater, had an audience with Hideyoshi, who then gave strict orders to mutilate the faces of the Franciscans and their faithful who had been arrested in Kyoto, to carry them around in the cities of Kyoto, Osaka and Sakai, and to bring them to Nagasaki to be crucified.
The official list of those condemned to death bore only 24 names. Two more Christians were added to the group on the way to Nagasaki. The prisoners had their left ear cut off. The 500-mile journey from Osaka to Nagasaki was made partly by land and partly by sea in small boats and lasted 26 days. They suffered much from the cold. On February 4, they eventually arrived at Sonogi, about 20 miles from Nagasaki.
The place of martyrdom of the 26 martyrs was a hill now called Nishizaka,[7] facing the city and Nagasaki Bay. It was a place of execution. In Japan, as in ancient Rome, the cross was abhorred because the worst criminals were crucified. More than once, Japanese said: "A religion which adores a crucified man cannot be good."
Fr. Peter Baptist,[8] a Spaniard, had often insisted on the scandal of the cross, and he now had to reproduce in his flesh the image of Christ crucified. On the way up the hill, a nobleman tempted the youngest boy, who was only 12 years old, to renounce his faith. But young Louis would not yield but eagerly asked: "Where is my cross?" When they pointed out the smallest one to him he immediately embraced it, and held on to it as a child clings to his toy. As soon as all 26 martyrs reached the top of their Calvary, they knelt down and sang the canticle "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel because he has visited and ransomed his people" (Lk. 2:68-79). Then Fr. Martin of the Ascension delivered a beautiful discourse on the excellence and inestimable grace of martyrdom which God had bestowed upon them. All were soon fastened with cords and iron rings to the crosses and raised aloft almost simultaneously. Paul Miki was too short for the cross they had fashioned for him. They stretched his legs to meet the rings on the lower leg beams. The crosses had been arranged in a semi circle with the Franciscans in the center. A sign with the inscription "Condemned to the death of the cross because they preached the forbidden Christian law" was placed in the center of the semicircle.
Hanging on the cross, Fr. Peter Baptist intoned the Te Deum, in which they all joined. Bro. Paul Miki, seeing the crowd of people, began to preach. The general idea of his sermon was:
The sentence of judgment says that these men came to Japan from the Philippines, but I did not come from any other country. I am a true Japanese. The only reason for my being killed is that I was teaching the doctrine of Christ. I thank God that this is the reason for which I die. After Christ's example, I forgive my persecutors. I do not hate them. I ask God to have pity on all, and I hope that my blood will fall on my fellow men as a fruitful rain.
The first to shed his blood was a Mexican Franciscan, Philip of Jesus, who had arrived on the San Filipe,[9] and had been arrested in Kyoto. The iron ring by which his neck had been fastened to the cross was suffocating him, so he asked that it be adjusted so he might die consciously. The executioner answered by piercing forthwith his chest with a spear. The last to arrive, he was the first to die with the name of Jesus and Mary on his lips. Among the martyrs were three boys. The two youngest, Anthony and Louis, were placed to the right of Fr. Peter Baptist. He had told them to sing the psalm Laudate pueri Dominum from the cross. Anthony asked him: "Should we start singing?" Fr. Peter Baptist, lost in contemplation with his eyes fixed on heaven, did not hear him. So the boys began to sing by themselves with a clear voice: "Praise the Lord, ye children, praise ye the name of the Lord." Scarcely had they finished this beautiful song of praise when their tender bodies were transfixed with a lance in each side. St. Peter Baptist, the leader of this holy band of martyrs, was reserved till the last. Filled with holy joy and consolation at seeing all the rest bravely shed their blood, he ceased not to encourage the assembled Christians to remain steadfast in the Faith, and to exhort the pagans to convert. Then, having forgiven his executioners, he was pierced with a lance in each side whilst a smile played on his lips.
Among the martyrs, St. Gonzalvo was born in India of a Portuguese father and an Indian mother. He is the first canonized saint born in India, and the patron saint of Bombay. At the age of 16, he came to Japan and worked for eight years as a catechist with the Jesuit Fathers. Having met a Franciscan Brother, John Pobre Diaz, who happened to visit Japan in 1582, Gonzalvo later went to Manila, where he became a Franciscan Brother in 1587. Brother Gonzalvo was fluent in Japanese, hence he was chosen to accompany Fr. Peter Baptist as an interpreter in 1593. In Japan, he greatly helped to establish the Franciscan mission. He was about 40 years old when he died, continually repeating the holy name of Jesus at Nagasaki.
St. Thomas Kozaki was the son of Michael Kozaki, a bow and arrow maker. As a boy of 11, he became acquainted with the friars when helping the carpenter to build the friary in Kyoto. He then became a student of the friars. He made good progress in doctrine and virtue and would certainly have become a good preacher. Later Thomas was an altar boy and a helper in the friary in Osaka. After the arrival of the San Filipe, he was with Philip of Jesus when he was arrested. After his martyrdom, a Portuguese found a letter, wet with blood, in the sleeve of his father, Michael. It had been written by Thomas to his mother. In it he told his mother not to worry about him and his father since they were going to heaven together and would wait for her to come. "Please come early," he wrote.
You must fear sin very much, since that causes Our Lord much suffering. If you commit a sin, you must confess and ask Our Lord's forgiveness. The pleasures of this world appear like a dream and fade away to nothing as a dream does. You must not forget everlasting happiness. If there is anyone who persecutes you, never hate him. Love him as Our Lord did on the cross. Please take care of my dear younger brother. I am always praying for you.
Thomas was 15 years old. The memory of this martyrdom was never forgotten even in the darkest hours of persecution. Christians would come secretly to the Holy Mountain to implore the martyrs to obtain from God fidelity for themselves and the conversion of their fellow men. The 26 martyrs of Nagasaki were canonized in Rome by Pope Pius IX on June 8, 1862.
Hideyoshi died on September 16, 1598, at the age of 63. A new but short period of prosperity for the missions in Japan began under his successor, Ieyasu, who founded the Tokugawa Shogunate, which was to govern the country until 1867. In September 1601, the first two Japanese priests were ordained in Nagasaki. In 1602, taking advantage of the benevolent attitude of the shogun, Augustinians and Dominicans arrived in Japan.
But in the month of April 1612, Christianity was again forbidden in the district directly controlled by Ieyasu, and Christians were martyred in Edo (now Tokyo). On January 27, 1614, Ieyasu issued an edict banishing all missionaries. The persecution continued with increasing fury during the next 20 years, until all outward signs of the Christian religion had been wiped out. By November, all the churches in Kyoto and Nagasaki had been destroyed. There were some 220,000 Christians in Japan at the beginning of the 17th century. Thousands of them gladly suffered the most cruel torments rather than deny their faith, among them let us mention the 55 martyrs of Kyoto. Of those who suffered martyrdom between the years 1616-32, 205 were beatified by Pope Pius IX in 1867. A few missionaries tried to enter the country, but they were soon arrested and executed.
Many Japanese were also martyred, among them, the 55 martyrs of Kyoto, who deserve a special mention. On October 6, 1619, they were burnt alive on the banks of the Kamo River in the presence of some 30,000 people. Young children were thus burnt in the arms of their mothers, who were crying: "Jesus, receive their souls!" When the firewood was lit, the martyrs said farewell to the crowd of Christians, who intoned the Magnificat and continued to sing psalms until the last martyr had died. As it had rained the night before, the firewood was wet and burnt slowly. After death had put an end to the victims' suffering, the crowd began the Te Deum. Among the martyrs was the heroic family of John Hashimoto Tahyoe, his wife Thecla and their five children: Catherine 13, Thomas 12, Francis 8, Peter 6, and Louisa 3. Thecla was holding little Louisa in her arms, and was seen wiping the tears on her daughter's cheeks. When the flames and smoke cleared, the mother was still holding her child in her arms, but both were dead.
Fr. Peter Kassui Kibe, a Japanese convert to Christianity, had managed to escape persecution and go to Rome. There he entered the Jesuits and was ordained to the priesthood. Later, he returned to Japan to minister to the oppressed Christians, but he was caught, tortured and suffered martyrdom in Tokyo in 1639.
The Hidden Christians
For more than 230 years, the Japanese Christians who survived persecutions had to hide their faith. In 1629, the ceremony of fumie was introduced. During the ceremony, Japanese were obliged to trample upon Christian images, especially bronze images of the Blessed Virgin, so as to discover hidden Christians. Missionaries, seeing themselves hunted down like wild beasts and condemned to be exterminated, had taught the faithful the capital importance of the act of contrition. They left them a little 3- or 4-page instruction on this act of repentance. The families which managed to keep the leaflets and even more the practice of the act of contrition, persevered in the Faith for more than two centuries. Those who gave up the practice lost the Faith. During all that time, there was no priest in Japan; the families of hidden Christians handed the Faith and baptism down from one generation to the next. These communities lived especially in villages in the area of Nagasaki.
On September 1, 1790, the first persecution began in Urakami (Nagasaki): hidden Christians were discovered and arrested. In 1797, the faithful hidden in Hishi Sonogi (Nagasaki) took refuge on the Island of Goto. In 1839, a new wave of persecution was launched in Urakami. But soon after, for economic reasons, Japan opened its ports again to foreigners and missionaries hastened to come back.
On May 4, 1844, Fr. Forcade of the Foreign Missions of Paris landed in Naha[10] together with a Chinese catechist to prepare the evangelization of Japan. He was appointed first Apostolic Vicar of Japan two years later. Other Fathers from the Foreign Missions of Paris also arrived in Japan. In 1856, a third persecution broke out in Urakami, and 80 Christians were imprisoned.
At last, things looked up, and in 1858, the end of the fumie was announced in Nagasaki. That same year, the government allowed churches to be built in the districts reserved for foreigners. In 1863, Frs. Petitjean and Furet, from the Foreign Missions of Paris, landed in Nagasaki. Their first care was to build a church in the Urakami district, which they naturally dedicated to Our Lady of the Assumption. In March 1865, the hidden Christians having heard that a priest was present, sent a delegation to Nagasaki. In order to ascertain that the stranger was truly a Catholic priest, they asked him who was his chief, if he prayed to the Blessed Virgin Mary, and whether he had children. When the priest told them that he was a subject of the Pope in Rome, that he loved the Blessed Virgin and prayed to her, and that he had neither children nor wife, they knew that he was the Catholic priest they had been expecting for years. With great joy, Fr. Petitjean discovered that in the neighboring villages, there were some 25 communities numbering several thousands of hidden Christians. Alas, during all these years many pagan practices had crept into Christian homes, and all did not agree to renounce them and submit to the priest. About 50 families of Crypto-Christians who practiced a mixture of Catholicism and Buddhism are still to be found nowadays in areas of Nagasaki, and more live on the Island of Goto.
The persecution of the Urakami Christians was rekindled in 1867 with the arrest of about 100 faithful, who were eventually released following protests from foreign consulates in Japan. In 1868, 13 Christians were executed. The representatives of foreign governments co-signed a letter of protest, which, however, did not prevent more than 3,000 Christians of Urakami to be arrested and exiled between 1868 and 1870. Evangelization was tacitly accepted in Japan only in 1873, and all the Urakami Christians were freed.
In December 1882, three Japanese priests were ordained. At long last, in 1889, the new constitution guaranteed religious liberty in Japan and put an end to three centuries of persecution.
Nagasaki: the Expiation
The blood of martyrs, a seed of Christians, made Nagasaki one of the largest Catholic centers of Japan in the 20th century. Fr. Maximilian Kolbe, who had come to Japan on April 24, 1929, had built the City of the Immaculata near Nagasaki, but on steep ground sloping away from the city. His choice had surprised many who thought it unwise. On August 9, 1945, at 11:02am, the Americans dropped their second atomic bomb over Nagasaki. It fell almost right on the cathedral located in Urakami district. This area, so deeply connected to the Christian history of Japan and which had given so many martyrs to the Church, became a real hell. After the bomb exploded, the temperature went up to over 7,000°F. That morning, many Japanese Catholics were going to confession in the cathedral, and were instantly killed by the explosion. At midnight, the remains of the cathedral burst into flames and it burnt to the ground. At exactly that same time, the emperor made known his decision to end the war. Today, nothing remains of the cathedral save a tiny portion of wall and the half-charred head of the statue of Our Lady of the Assumption. Because of its location, the City of the Immaculata was protected, and all acknowledged the wisdom of the choice made by Fr. Kolbe.
Beyond the controversies concerning the use of the atomic bomb, Dr. Paul Nagaï, a Japanese radiologist converted to Catholicism and whose wife was killed by the bomb, looked upon the event from a Christian viewpoint. On November 23, 1945, in front of the ruins of the Cathedral of the Assumption in Urakami, he pronounced a famous funeral address on the occasion of the Requiem Mass offered for the 8,000 Catholics killed by the atomic bomb.
On August 15, the Imperial Decree which put an end to the fighting was formally promulgated and the whole world saw the light of peace. August 15 is also the date that St. Francis Xavier, our first Christian preacher, arrived in Japan. August 15 is also the great feast of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary. It is significant, I believe, that the Urakami Cathedral was dedicated to her....Is there not a profound relationship between the annihilation of Nagasaki and the end of the war? Was not Nagasaki the chosen victim, the lamb without blemish, slain as a whole-burnt offering on an altar of sacrifice, atoning for the sins of all nations during World War II?...Let us be thankful that Nagasaki has been chosen for this holocaust. Let us be thankful, for through this sacrifice, peace has been given to the world as well as religious freedom to Japan.
Catholic Japan Today
Figures speak for themselves: out of 127 million inhabitants, Japan numbers today 450,000 Japanese Christians and 550,000 Christian immigrants. The Society of Saint Pius X has one Japanese priest: Fr. Thomas of Mary Onoda, who was ordained in 1993. He is in charge of the apostolate in his homeland, a difficult apostolate, which is reduced to a five-day visit every month to two Mass centers: Osaka (20 Japanese), and Tokyo (40 faithful, 10 of whom are foreigners).
Japanese bishops are very modernist, anti-Roman, and anti-scholastic. They violently oppose the Society of Saint Pius X. St. Francis Xavier and all of the Japanese Martyrs, pray for us!
1 St. Francis Xavier, Letter 90, To his Companions Living in Goa, from Kagoshima, November 5, 1549.
2 Ibid.
3 Ibid.
4 In today's prefecture of Nagasaki, on the island of Kyushu.
5 Nobunaga had built his castle on Mount Azuchi.
6 Lake Biwa, or Biwa-ko is the largest freshwater lake in Japan (670 km2). It is located in the center of the prefecture of Shiga, to the north-east of Kyoto.
7 The 26 Japanese martyrs of 1587 were followed by 600 others who underwent martyrdom on that hill during the bloody persecutions in Japan.
8 Franciscan Fr. Peter Baptist had arrived in Japan on August 27, 1593, and had a private audience with Hideyoshi at the time.
9 The San Filipe, a Spanish galleon, had run ashore near Japan and sought shelter in the port of Urado. Hideyoshi had taken the ship's cargo. Rumor had it that the angry captain had told him that the Emperor of Spain could conquer Japan by first sending missionaries as spies. Were these unfortunate words uttered by an angry man, or sheer calumny? After this incident, Hideyoshi gave orders to exterminate all missionaries and Catholics.
10 Naha is a city located on one of the small islands to the south of Kyushu and not far from the Island of Taiwan.
Political System in Japan and Some Relevant Terms
The emperor was considered as a descendant of the goddess Sun. Until 1945, this belief was an official dogma in Japan. From the 9th century onwards, the emperor began to lose his power, and from the 12th century, though the old form of civil government was not abolished, Japan was in fact governed by warriors. The emperor remained venerated but without actual power.
The shogun, chief general of the imperial army, from the end of the 12th century became the head of the government. The imperial court, in Kyoto, remained without actual authority and was deprived of the administration of the country. The shogunate became a hereditary charge. The Ashikaga family reigned from 1338 until 1597, and established the capital in Kyoto. This 250-year shogunate was troubled by continual civil wars of which the daimyos and the Buddhist monastery took advantage to form their own armies and territories. After 1603, the Tokugawa family seized power and made Tokyo its capital.
The daimyos [say: dī-myō] were feudal lords, vassals of the shogun. They lived in their domains. The continual civil wars from the 14th to the 16th century weakened the power of the shogun to the benefit of the daimyos who became quite powerful.
The kuge was a nobleman living at court.
The samurai [say: săm′ (y)ərī′] was the knight of feudal Japan. These aristocratic warriors had the privilege of carrying two swords. Their particular virtues were indifference to pain and death, and especially an unfailing loyalty to their lords.
Short Chronology of Persecutions in Japan
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