Catholic Church in Japan

• 
  Japanese mosaic of Madonna and Child, in the Church of the Annunciation, Nazareth (a gift from Japanese Catholics to the church)
• 
  Gravestone (second from the left), in Malacca's St. Paul's Church, of Peter Martinez consecrated as the second bishop of Japan in Goa, 1595 and arrived in Nagasaki, 1596. He left in 1597 following the deaths of the 26 Martyrs of Japan. Died en route to Goa in February 1598.[6]

The Catholic Church in Japan is organised into 15 dioceses, 3 of which are classified as metropolitan dioceses that head each of the 3 ecclesiastical provinces in the country.

Map of the ecclesiastical provinces and dioceses of Japan (Japanese).

Ecclesiastical Province of Osaka

• Metropolitan Archdiocese of Osaka-Takamatsu
  • Diocese of Hiroshima
  • Diocese of Kyoto
  • Diocese of Nagoya

Basilica of the Twenty-Six Holy Martyrs of Japan (Nagasaki)

The Catholic Church is involved in religious education in Japan, providing learning opportunities to both Catholic and non-Catholic students. According to the Catholic Bishops' Conference of Japan, Japan has a total of 828 Catholic educational institutions. The Church operates different types of schools, which can be seen below:[8]

Sophia University Yotsuya Campus in Tokyo, Japan.

The Jesuit Sophia University in Chiyoda, Tokyo is listed in the Times Higher Education and QS Global University rankings, and is considered one of the top private universities in Japan.[9][10] It is one of 37 universities selected by the Japanese Government to participate in the Top Global University Project and receive financial assistance to boost globalisation in Japan and foster research.[11]

Other Catholic universities in Japan include Nanzan University (Nagoya, Aichi) and the Elisabeth University of Music (Hiroshima, Hiroshima).

Statue of St Paul Miki, who is a member of the Twenty-Six Martyrs of Japan, in St Martin's Church in Bamberg, Germany.

Founded in 1986, the Committee for Promoting Canonisation, which is directly affiliated with the Standing Committee of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of Japan, is responsible for promoting Japan's canonisation efforts and recognition of its martyrs. Its main objectives are to support local dioceses in promoting cases for canonisation, support canonisation promoted by the Conference, and promotion devotions to Japanese Catholic martyrs.

All Catholic martyrs in Japan, both native Japanese and foreign missionaries, were persecuted and killed during the Sakoku period of Japanese isolationism. Some of the groups of martyrs and individual martyrs were later canonised and venerated as saints in the Church's liturgical calendar.

There are some minor differences between the mass in Japan and the mass in other countries. For example, before Communion, most languages quote from the centurion of Matthew 8 ("Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed"). In Japanese, however, the saying is 「主よ、あなたは神の子キリスト、永遠の命の糧、あなたをおいてだれのところへ行きましょう」 (Rōmaji : shu yo, anata wa kami no ko Kirisuto, eien no inochi no kate, anata o oite dare no tokoro e ikimashō; English: "Lord, you are the Christ, the Son of God, the bread of eternal life, to whom shall I leave thee?"),[13] taken from quotes of Simon Peter in John 6 and Matthew 16.

• Pope John Paul II (1981) became the first pontiff to visit Japan. He had gone to the atomic bomb memorial sites in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.[14]
• Pope Francis (November 2019) visited Japan for the first in decades. He visited the late former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Emperor Naruhito at the Tokyo Imperial Palace, Sophia University, and the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Hypocenter Park.[15]

• Christianity in Japan
• List of Saints from Asia
• Kirishitan
• History of the Catholic Church in Japan
• Tarō Asō
• Martyrdom of the 26 Saints of Japan
• Lorenzo Ruiz
• Silence, the acclaimed historical novel by Shūsaku Endō drawn from the oral histories of the "Hidden Christian" communities (Kakure Kirishitan and Hanare Kirishitan) that survived the 17th century state suppression of the Catholic Church in Japan.
• Domingos Chohachi Nakamura, the 1st Japanese missionary to work abroad, he emigrated to Brazil in 1923 to work on behalf of the Japanese living there. His process of beatification started in 2002.
• Our Lady of Akita

• GCatholic.org on the Catholic Church in Japan
• Catholic Bishops' Conference of Japan
• Catholic churches in Japan