Fun Fact: Catholicism in Japan
October 6, 2008
Francis Xavier landed in Japan in 1549. Within half a century, the government forbade Christianity and kicked missionaries out. There is religious freedom today, but less than one percent of the population is Catholic. This small number, however, includes new Prime Minister Taro Aso.
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The Catholic population in Japan endured the persecutions from the Shogun and the bombings of World War II. They also have Our Lady of Akita which was recently approved by Cardinal Ratzinger himself of the apparitions.
Did the Vatican approve Akita? I note that they have condemned Medjugorje in no uncertain terms.
Interestingly, before the Faith was banned in the late 16th Century, as much as 10% of the population had converted. The 16th is often called Japan’s “Christian Century.”
Many believers kept the Faith alive in their families and became known as Kakure Kirishitan (“Hidden Christians”). Over the years, without access to the Sacraments or the outside Catholic world, their beliefs morphed. (For example, some came to believe that He came to Japanm, married a local woman, and is buried in what is now Aomori Prefecture.) When the Catholics returned to Meiji Japan in the 19th Century. most Kakure Kirishitan recognized the Faith of their fathers and returned to the Catholic fold. Others, however, stubbornly held on to what they saw as the old faith, with all its additions.
Spirit of Vatican II
It is patently untrue that the Vatican has “condemned Medjugorje in no uncertain terms.” Such statements are incorrect and false. While there are many who would wish to condemn Medjugorje, the Vatican has yet to either approve nor disapprove of the alleged apparitions there and will probably not do so until the apparitions cease. For the most reliable information, the Vatican site should be checked, not other individuals, groups or sites that purport to speak for the Vatican or interpret the Vatican.
I thought two priests involved in Medjugorje had been suspended and that parish or diocesan pilgrimages there had been forbidden since the mid 1980s; the content of the messages has also been severely censured by Cardinal Ratzinger. To be sure, I read this in a newspaper, not on the Vatican site. But the Vatican site does not cover all Vatican decisions.
I thought two priests involved in Medjugorje had been suspended and that parish or diocesan pilgrimages there had been forbidden since the mid 1980s; the content of the messages has also been severely censured by Cardinal Ratzinger. To be sure, I read this in a newspaper, not on the Vatican site. But the Vatican site does not cover all Vatican decisions.
According to the following link, the Vatican has again and again discouraged pilgrimages, and regards the apparitions with suspicion (Benedict XVI believes it certain that they do not have a supernatural origin)
: http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0603480.htm
The only reference a search at the Vatican website turns up is a 2005 reference to Medjugorje in an article on pilgrimage reprinted from a French journal (which says that the Church has not officially recognized the apparition). With Benedict XVI as Pope the wind is blowing more unfavorably for Medjugorje.
TIMES article in FEb 2006:
Benedict is now already moving against private revelations in a way his predecessor did not. Two cases signal his intent. Barely a month after his election, the CDF issued two documents. One was a decree removing Father Gino Burresi from active ministry, and the other was a letter to the Filipino bishops effectively declaring as false the claims of Ida Peerdeman, a Dutch seer, that the Virgin Mary had revealed new truths about her status.
…
But by far the biggest challenge to any efforts by the Pope to deal decisively with the phenomenon of private revelations are the claims of six seers from Medjugorje who say the Virgin Mary has been visiting them for more than 20 years.
In that time the Madonna has allegedly dispatched 40,000 bland messages, given 57 secrets (none of which has been revealed), performed countless miracles (none of which has been confirmed), and has toured the world with the seers, appearing on demand even in the backs of vans.
Between four and five million pilgrims have visited Medjugorje, including the Spanish tenor José Carreras, who performed there, and the American actor Jim Caviezel, who sought inspiration while filming The Passion of the Christ.
Yet the only rulings to date on Medjugorje — made by the local bishops, the competent ecclesiastical authorities — are that the claims are false and that the seers are lying.
There is a mounting expectation that Benedict will eventually move against this unauthorised Marian cult, some of whose supporters, like those of Father Burresi, hold high office in the Church and were rumoured to have persuaded John Paul not to intervene.
But the Burresi affair has shown Benedict’s resolve to deal with factions who have their own agendas.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article729488.ece