The visit to Japan of His Holiness Pope Francisco

November 30, 2019

Seisuke FUKUHIMA, Japan

HH Pope Francisco visited Japan from November 23, 2019 November 26,2019 and visited Nagasaki, Hiroshima and Tokyo.

Pope Francisco was passionately welcomed by Japanese people and foreign residents .His visit to Japan was realized after 38 years laps of time when Pope John Paul II had made a holy trip in 1981.

During His visit in Japan ,Pope Francisco stressed that ,even though catholic Christians occupy only 0.4 of the total population of 125 million, and that foreign Catholics living in Japan surpass Japanese Catholics, historically speaking, martyrs and hiding Christians give Japanese Christians today strength and profoundness of their faith. 

In Nagasaki where an atomic bomb was dropped on the historical catholic church( a hiding old lady came out and met a French priest) , the church was completely destroyed (and reconstructed later).Pope Francisco appealed to the political leaders of the world that “ the world without nuclear weapons is possible and necessary.

In Hiroshima where an atomic bomb was also dropped and caused tremendous human casualties, Pope Francisco said “ I came here as a peace pilgrim. With solidarity of all the peoples I prey that our heart will be made change to peace , reconciliation and fraternity”. He said that the usage of atomic power for war purpose is against ethics.

In Tokyo, 50,000 catholic attended the holy mass. Outside the Tokyo Dome where Pope gave a holy mass, tens of thousand of non-Japanese people as well as Japanese who had no chance of the holy mass gathered there to see Pope Francisco.

He met the Emperor and the Prime Minister during his stay in Tokyo.