Japan Church Records: Difference between revisions

In July 1861, the young Russian Hieromonk, Nikolay Kassatkin (subsequently canonized and known as Nicholas of Japan), arrived in Hakodate to serve at the Consulate as a priest. He proved to be the first to learn the local language and customs to be able to spread Orthodox Christianity amongst the local populace. Though the shōgun's government at the time prohibited Japanese conversion to Christianity, some locals who frequented the chapel did convert in 1864. While they were his first converts in Japan, they were not the first Japanese to become Orthodox Christians: some Japanese who had settled in Russia had converted to Orthodox Christianity. On Kassatkin′s initiative, the Russian Imperial government established the Russian Spiritual Mission to Japan in 1870.

Kassatkin moved to Tokyo in 1872 and went on to stay in Japan most of the time until his death in 1912, even during the Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905). Kassatkin travelled across Russia to collect funds for construction of the Orthodox Cathedral in Tokyo. By the end of 1890, according to Kassatkin′s report, the Orthodox Church in Japan had 18,625 baptized faithful.

During the Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945), which from 1939 to 1945 was part of World War II, the Christians in Japan suffered severe conditions, the Orthodox Church especially. During the war the Japanese Orthodox Church had had almost no foreign contact. Following the surrender of Japan (August 1945), the occupation regime had a benevolent attitude toward Christian groups, given their predominantly American connections. As the majority of the Slavic- and Greek-Americans would attend local Orthodox Christian parishes and more Russian refugees began to arrive in Japan fleeing the Communist regime in China, the Orthodox Christian community in Japan was re-invigorated. In 1946, the precursor to the Orthodox Church in America (OCA), took steps to prevent the Moscow Patriarchate from re-establishing its control over the Japanese Church. The following year, the Japanese Church largely switched over under the Metropolia′s jurisdiction and would be governed by bishops sent from the U.S. by the Metroplia until March 1972.