History UsefulNotes / JapaneseChristian

[[caption-width-right:300:A fumi-e stone. 17th-century Japanese Christians (or people suspected of being Christian) were forced to stamp on them to abjure their faith and prove they were not Christians.]]

[[caption-width-right:300:A fumi-e stone. 17th-century Japanese Christians (or suspects of being Christian) were forced to stamp on them to abjure their faith and prove they were not Christians.]]

[[caption-width-right:300:A fumi-e stone. 17th-century Japanese Christians (or suspects of being Christian) were forced to trample them to abjure their faith or prove they were not Christians.]]

** Complementing ''Silence'' is another of Endo's novels, ''Samurai'', which is based on the life of Hasekura Rokuemon, a real life Japanese Christian emissary from UsefulNotes/DateMasamune who visited various nations of Europe at the beginning of 17th century, only to return to a Japan where his religion is being actively persecuted.

* Creator/ShusakuEndo is Japanese Christian writer whose work shows clear influence from his faith. He wrote several novels about many subjects, but the most famous is ''Film/{{Silence}}'' (''Chinmoku'' in Japanese), about a 17th-century Portuguese missionary in Japan who has to shepherd his flock through the initial Tokugawa persecution. He also wrote numerous short stories and various other novels on the topic, including ''[[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin A Life of Jesus]]''. And, of course, ''Literature/DeepRiver'', a.k.a. ''Japanese Christianity: The Book.'' It served as a very personal account of what it means to be a Christian in a country that's 99% atheist/Buddhist/Shinto and extremely suspicious of outside influences.
** Complementing ''Silence'' is another of Endo's novels, ''Samurai'', which is based on the life of Hasekura Rokuemon, a real life Japanese Christian emissary from UsefulNotes/DateMasumune who visited various nations of Europe at the beginning of 17th century, only to return to a Japan where his religion is being actively persecuted.

UsefulNotes/{{Christianity}} is rare enough in UsefulNotes/{{Japan}} that a character being explicitly labeled as such is rather unusual[[note]]How unusual? There are only 1-2 million Christians in Japan, comprising a ''very'' small fraction of the population (1.5 percent)[[/note]]. This was not always the case. Christianism arrived in the Japanese islands during their first decades of sea trade with the Kingdoms of UsefulNotes/{{Portugal}}'s and UsefulNotes/{{Spain}}, producing a fairly substantial Christian base. The first Jesuit mission to Japan started evangelizing the region in 1548, and by 1589, when Spain and Portugal became a dynastic union under UsefulNotes/PhilipII, there were about 200,000 Japanese Christians (amongst a total population of no more than twenty-four million). This was probably the largest overseas Christian community (yes, even more than China or Latin America, despite the substantially higher monetary investment and slight head-start in the latter region) and was unique in that it was mostly staffed and run by ethnic Japanese. Initially, this evangelization effort was allowed and even endorsed by UsefulNotes/OdaNobunaga (in a bid to neutralize/strip away the Buddhist temples' influence and opposition to his conquests--[[MoralityKitchenSink not helped by these temples' ties to his]] ''daimyo'' opponents--in a form of {{Realpolitik}}).

UsefulNotes/{{Christianity}} is rare enough in UsefulNotes/{{Japan}} that a character being explicitly labeled as such is rather unusual[[note]]How unusual? There are only 1-2 million Christians in Japan, comprising a ''very'' small fraction of the population (1.5 percent)[[/note]]. This was not always the case. During the first decades of the Kingdom of UsefulNotes/{{Portugal}}'s trade with the Japanese islands, there was a fairly substantial Christian base. The first Jesuit mission to Japan started evangelizing the region in 1548, and by 1589 there were about 200,000 Japanese Christians (amongst a total population of no more than twenty-four million). This was probably the largest overseas Christian community (yes, even more than China or Latin America, despite the substantially higher monetary investment and slight head-start in the latter region) and was unique in that it was mostly staffed and run by ethnic Japanese. Initially, this evangelization effort was allowed and even endorsed by UsefulNotes/OdaNobunaga (in a bid to neutralize/strip away the Buddhist temples' influence and opposition to his conquests--[[MoralityKitchenSink not helped by these temples' ties to his]] ''daimyo'' opponents--in a form of {{Realpolitik}}).

This was partly because of pre-Tridentine Catholic practice, which was lax and didn't care much for orthodoxy (the priority was on conversion), and Japan's cultural-religious tradition. Like UsefulNotes/{{Taoism}} or UsefulNotes/{{Hinduism}}, UsefulNotes/{{Shinto}} is a polytheistic system of belief without set doctrines or leadership, and is home to several different schools of both. UsefulNotes/{{Buddhism}}, for instance, was almost seamlessly integrated into Shinto within just a century or two of its arrival in the Japanese Islands (at least partly because Orthodox [Chinese-style] Buddhism was regarded with suspicion and semi-exterminated). Today, many Buddhist temples coexist with Shinto shrines, and many Japanese people practice both Shinto and Buddhist rituals. The phenomenon of Japanese [[UsefulNotes/KatanasOfTheRisingSun "martial" Shinto-Buddhism ]] is quite notable in comparison to the pacifistic Indo-Chinese strains of Buddhism. The former arguably -- fused with a twisted form of neo-Bushido doctrine -- saw something of an apotheosis in the Tokubetsu Kogeki/"[[SuicideAttack Special Attack]]" units of the [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarTwo final, desperate months]] [[UsefulNotes/ImperialJapan of the military's period in power]].

Christianity, however, was increasingly seen as a threat to the existing social order. This was exacerbated by the Protestant Dutch, who hoped to undermine their trade rivals by spreading rumors of Portugal's previous conquests. The fact that the King of Portugal actually asked the priests about the feasibility of an invasion of Japan probably didn't help (driving the paranoia of UsefulNotes/ToyotomiHideyoshi and laying the groundwork for anti-Christian prejudice). Neither did their numerous military activities and the destruction of Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples. Thus, with the ascent of UsefulNotes/TokugawaIeyasu and his devout Buddhist family line (not to mention retainers), Catholic Christians were harshly persecuted during the Edo period (the early 1600s) and driven underground out of fear that Japanese peasants and samurai would feel more loyal to a foreign Pope than their own lord. What followed was a bloodbath, with all priests (Portuguese or otherwise) being expelled or crucified (and yes, they did do that on purpose). Converts were hunted (one practice being that soldiers would go to villages and demand they stomp on a fumi-e, a picture of Jesus or Mary -- any which showed hesitation were branded Christians) and sent to Nagasaki to be tortured. If they refused to recant, they were also crucified.

** Usagi learns of Christianity's existence in the 2018 arc "The Hidden" when the shogunate attempts to root them out of a town. He's not particularly impressed by what he hears, but his friend Inspector Ishida is investigating the murder of a samurai who wore a cross under his kimono. [[spoiler: And the final page shows to the reader that Ishida is himself Christian.]]

* Yukihiro "Matz" Matsumoto, chief designer of the Ruby programming language, is a devout Mormon

UsefulNotes/{{Christianity}} is rare enough in UsefulNotes/{{Japan}} that a character being explicitly labeled as such is rather unusual[[note]]How unusual? There are only 1-2 million Christians in Japan, comprising a ''very'' small fraction of the population (1.5 percent)[[/note]]. This was not always the case. During the first decades of the Kingdom of UsefulNotes/{{Portugal}}'s trade with the Japanese islands, there was a fairly substantial Christian base. The first Jesuit mission to Japan started evangelizing the region in 1548, and by 1589 there were about 200,000 Japanese Christians (amongst a total population of no more than twenty-four million). This was probably the largest overseas Christian community (yes, even more than China or Latin America, despite the substantially higher monetary investment and slight head-start in the latter region) and was unique in that it was mostly staffed and run by ethnic Japanese.

Christianity, however, was increasingly seen as a threat to the existing social order. Christians were harshly persecuted during the Edo period (the early 1600s) and driven underground out of fear that Japanese peasants and samurai would feel more loyal to a foreign Pope than their own lord. This was exacerbated by the Protestant Dutch, who hoped to undermine their trade rivals by spreading rumors of Portugal's previous conquests. The fact that the King of Portugal actually asked the priests about the feasibility of an invasion of Japan probably didn't help. Neither did their numerous military activities and the destruction of Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples. What followed was a bloodbath, with all priests (Portuguese or otherwise) being expelled or crucified (and yes, they did do that on purpose). Converts were hunted (one practice being that soldiers would go to villages and demand they stomp on a fumi-e, a picture of Jesus or Mary -- any which showed hesitation were branded Christians) and sent to Nagasaki to be tortured. If they refused to recant, they were also crucified.

Nowadays, if a Japanese Christian does appear in anime and manga or even Western media they will typically be from Kyushu especially Nagasaki which has a historically significant Catholic population or occasionally another area like Tokyo.

* ''Anime/WeissKreuz'': Ken was raised Catholic, even spending a period of time in a Church orphanage, and it ''shows''. In later canon, Aya also shows interest in the faith - it's arguable whether or not he actually ''practices'' it, and in any case he doesn't hold with its doctrine of forgiveness, but a conversation with a nun in ''[[RadioDrama Fight Fire With Fire]]'' reveals that he's worn out a Bible reading it every night before he sleeps.
* ''Anime/WelcomeToTheNHK'': Misaki's aunt is one and forces Misaki to attend church groups as a condition of taking her in.
* ''Manga/{{X1999}}'': Karen Kasumi. Her mother converted both of them to it, though it seems that it was only to hide from cults who wanted to use Karen's fire powers for their own ends.