Christian sites in Japan

Japan's introduction to Christianity came in 1549 by way of the Portuguese and Saint Francis Xavier. He established the first Christian church in Yamaguchi at Daidoji Temple, whose ruins are now part of Xavier Memorial Park and the Xavier Memorial Church was built in his honor.

Cenotaph for Christian martyrs in Tsuwano

When Toyotomi Hideyoshi came into power, Christianity was banned and Christians were persecuted. Nagasaki is the most famous persecution site where 26 Japanese Christians were crucified. They are saints today and you can visit the memorial for these martyrs in the city. The Shimabara Rebellion is the most famous Christian uprising in Japan, and it was this rebellion that led to the ousting of the Portuguese and Catholic practices from Japan (although Christianity had already been banned by this time), along with approximately 37,000 beheadings of Christians and peasants. In Shimabara, you can visit the ruins of Hara Castle, where the Christians gathered and were attacked, see old Portuguese tombstones, and the samurai houses, some of which were occupied by Christian samurai. Oyano's Amakusa Shiro Memorial Hall contains videos of the Shimabara Rebellion and great displays related to Christian persecution. Less famous sites may be off the beaten path, like the Martyrdom Museum and Memorial Park for martyrs in Ichinoseki. When the nation reopened, some Christians assumed that meant that they were able to practice Christianity freely and openly, so they came out after 200 years of practicing secretly. Unfortunately, it was still not legal and these Christians were brought together in various parts of the country and tortured. You can see one of these sites at Maria Cathedral in Tsuwano, built in the Otome Pass in the area where Christians were put into tiny cages and tortured.

Along with the Martyrdom Site, Nagasaki is also home to Oura Church, the oldest church left in the nation, built in 1864. Because of Nagasaki's status for many years as one of the nation's only ports where outsiders could come, the city is rich in Japanese Christian history, so even the museums here have artifacts and information about the Christian community.

The Japanese word for Christianity, キリスト教 (Kirisuto-kyō), is a compound of Kirisuto (キリスト), the Japanese adaptation of the Portuguese word for Christ, and the Sino-Japanese word for doctrine (教 kyō, a teaching or precept), as in Bukkyō (仏教, "Buddhism").

While there may be up to 3 million Japanese Christians, Christianity in Japan is spread among many denominational affiliations (roughly 36% Catholic, 36% Protestant, 15% Jehovah's Witness, 9% Mormon, and 2% Orthodox). 70% of Japanese churches have an average attendance of less than 30, though membership is often double this figure. While Christians represent roughly 1-2% of the population, there have been eight Christian prime ministers in Japan (out of 66 as of 2020, or around 12%).

Strangely, you can often find Christian objects in temples and shrines throughout the country. This is because many of these objects were hidden in temples and shrines back when Christianity was forbidden. Christians had been persecuted and martyred during the Tokugawa shogunate starting around 1617, and by 1638 the ban on Christianity became more strongly enforced and the remaining Christians had been forced to publicly renounce their faith. Many continued practicing Christianity in secret, becoming what are known in modern times as Kakure Kirishitan (隠れキリシタン "hidden Christians"). They disguised figurines of the saints and Virgin Mary as statues of the Buddha and bodhisattvas, adapted prayers to sound like Buddhist chants, and passed down the Bible and parts of the liturgy orally.

After Japan ended its isolationist foreign policy in 1853, many Christian clergymen were sent and began building churches. On March 17, 1865, shortly after the completion of the original Ōura Church in Nagasaki, a group of people approached Father Bernard Petitjean and asked to see the statue of the Virgin Mary. Petitjean discovered that these people were Kakure Kirishitans from the nearby village of Urakami. Before long, tens of thousands of underground Christians came out of hiding in the Nagasaki area. Petitjean found that they had kept the rite of baptism and the liturgical years without European priests for nearly 250 years, leading to Pope Pius IX declaring this "the miracle of the Orient". The majority of Kakure Kirishitan rejoined the Catholic Church after renouncing unorthodox, syncretic practices, although some did not and became known as the Hanare Kirishitan (離れキリシタン, "separated Christians").

In 2018, 12 Christian sites were added to the World Heritage Site List, under the name "Hidden Christian Sites in the Nagasaki Region".