Kakure Kirishitan, the hidden Christians of Japan

This photo, by anthropologist and documentary film-maker Christal Whelan, shows two Japanese priests performing the "Otaiya Ceremony in observance of Christmas eve, during which a Kakure Kirishitan priest places a ball of rice in the palm of another priest in a rite reminiscent of the Eucharist." Modern Kakure Kirishitan are a small, disappearing remnant of the "hidden Christians" who continued to practice their faith after the suppression of the Christian religion in seventeenth-century Japan. They still say prayers in Latin and Portuguese, although they no longer understand their meaning. Over the years the faith has evolved into a form of ancestor worship focused on the martyrs of the early persecutions. According to an article by Patrick Downes of the Catholic Education Resource Center:

The Kakure Kirishitan were once an estimated 150,000 in number. They were those who, newly infused with the Catholic faith four centuries ago, took their religion underground to escape persecution, torture and death.

The Catholic faith was brought to Japan in 1549 by the great Jesuit missionary to Asia, St. Francis Xavier. Last year Japan celebrated the 450th anniversary of his arrival at Kagoshima at the bottom end of Kyushu, the southernmost of Japan's four major islands. Warmly welcomed by Japanese leaders, Xavier and his fellow missionaries baptized hundreds of people before he departed two years later.

Jesuits missionaries under the Portuguese flag continued Xavier's missionary efforts, mostly on Kyushu, reporting 300,000 converts before the century's end.

It wasn't long, however, before Japanese lords began to view the enthusiastic Christians as a threat to the stability of the nation. They began a systematic persecution that led to the torture and death of thousands of Japanese Catholics. The canonized Nagasaki martyrs were victims of the persecution of 1597.

Another great persecution took place in the mid-1600s. Catholics who did not renounce their faith were crucified, dismembered, lowered headfirst in excrement, or suffered other cruel means of torture and death.

Thousands took their faith underground. In order to practice their religion without detection, they eliminated most external symbols and books, disguising their rituals, and committing prayers and snatches of Scripture to memory.

Missionaries were banned from Japan for 200 years until the middle of the 19th century when the French reintroduced Catholicism to the country. At this time, some of the Hidden Christians came forth and rejoined the Catholic Church. Others did not recognize the French Catholicism as the faith of their ancestors. Centuries of concealment and isolation had changed their faith into something unique with secrecy an integral part of its doctrine.

The Hidden Christians worshiped and prayed together and offered each other mutual support. But because the initial introduction to Christianity lasted barely one generation, their education in the faith was somewhat rudimentary. Nevertheless, they turned their inadequate instruction into a practice that developed its own hereditary priesthood, observed holy days and administered the sacrament of Baptism.

Silence, by Shusako Endo, is a beautiful, heart-wrenching novel based on the period of persecution in Japan. Endo's work in general is what modern Christian literature ought to be but very often isn't -- complex, humane, profound, and mysterious.

Comments

[Zsa Zsa]

That is so sad and yet so sweet at the same time.

[JBelle]

Merry Christmas, Gail. I hope you stumble and struggle in blessings knee high. :)

[gail]

You too JBelle. Merry Christmas to you and yours -- and your little dogs too!