Paul KeenanNagasaki to host new museum
The Japanese city of Nagasaki has been announced as the site of a museum dedicated to the memory of the country’s ‘hidden Christians’.
Plans are in train in cooperation with the Archdiocese of Nagasaki to open the new museum in January to mark the 150th anniversary of the rediscovery, in 1865, of the small community of Japanese Christians, known locally as Kakure Kirishitan who, despite persecution by the Tokugawa Shogunate during the Edo period (1603-1867) and complete isolation from Rome for two centuries, remained faithful while pursuing a secret existence.
When the authorities finally granted the community the right to open its own church on the outskirts of Nagasaki in 1865, the community came out of hiding and began to flourish.
However, the story of the hidden Christians was almost completely lost again when Nagasaki became the site of the second atomic bombing of 1945 and many members with oral records of the community perished.
The Nagasaki archdiocese will now oversee the remaining collection of artefacts donated to the new museum, such as religious medals and icons, and even a Buddha bearing a hidden cross on his back.
In January, the Vatican announced plans to fully digitise the Marega Papers – its collection of 10,000 documents relating to the persecution of Japan’s Christians in the 17th to
19th Centuries.