Japan Jesuits produced "Japan - a Mission Country?!" introducing the Society of Jesus, Japan Province. Our calling, and missions and need for younger hands to continue the Lord's mission. Introduction Japan is numbered among the G-8 countries. Despite many economic and political problems, Japan is one of the world’s most stable and advanced nations and can be duly proud of its highly safe state-of-the-art transportation system and its universal health care. How then can Japan be called a “mission country”? In a total population of some 127 million, about 1% call themselves Christian, but the registered Catholic population comes to only 0.3% of the total population, barely visible on the horizon. This, however, does not mean that Christ and Christian values have not been preached in Japan. The great apostle of Asia, St Francis Xavier, first brought Christ to Japan in 1549. The Society of Jesus was re-missioned to Japan in 1908 when Pope Pius X authorized the founding of a Catholic university in Tokyo. Today Sophia University is the Society’s most influential presence in this largely secular society. During the last hundred years the Society of Jesus has extended its outreach into society with numerous parishes and attached kindergartens, four secondary schools, Sophia University in Tokyo and Elisabeth University of Music in Hiroshima, four retreat houses, three social centers, and a martyrs’ shrine in Nagasaki. When Fr Pedro Arrupe was Provincial of Japan before becoming General in 1965, there were over 440 Jesuits in the Province. Fr Arrupe, himself a victim of the Second World War and the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, had urged Fr General Janssens to appeal to provinces all over the world to send Jesuits to help instill Christian values in Japan as it rose from the ashes of World War II. The response, mainly from Europe and the Americas, was overwhelming and even today Jesuits in Japan still hail from more than 20 provinces. They have all gone through an intensive language program and the great majority have been tremendously successful in contributing to our major works or in opening up new frontiers. In recent years some men from various Asian countries like India, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Korea, have generously come to work as missionaries. We are presently discerning how to concentrate our personnel in works that are still “frontier” works in Japan. Sophia University will continue to require men to work at the frontiers of teaching and research and to staff its Catholic ministry center. Our spirituality centers will continue to accompany people in their desire to respond to the call of God. Our parishes, fewer in number, will provide an arena for bible study, introduction to Christianity, and church weddings and funerals for Catholics and non-Catholics alike. Many of our educational and apostolic centers have been sending volunteers to serve the homeless and to help rebuild the areas of Japan devastated by the earthquake and tsunami of March 11, 2011. The physical devastation of Japan in that appalling natural disaster is paralleled by great spiritual devastation—more than 30,000 suicides a year, increasing instances of domestic violence and dysfunctional families, abortions, withdrawals from society, and many workers rendered homeless through unemployment. There is also a general distrust of religions, aggravated by the disruptive behavior of some extremist cults. However, a deep hunger and thirst for the eternal and transcendent can be felt beneath all these negative factors. Our universities and secondary schools, parishes and social centers do what they can to make available the Lord’s healing hand, but our human hands are few. Maybe you will feel called to add your own hands to this great work of Christ begun by Xavier but still amounting to a mere blip on the horizon of one of the most densely populous countries in the world.

• published: 26 Jul 2015
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