Hidden Christian Sites in the Nagasaki Region

Oura Church is easy to visit and combined with the Glover Garden next door. Of all the sites inscribed I think this is the only one not off the beaten path, after all the sites were supposed to be hidden. Wait wut? Reading the inscription I always thought they were about hidden sites, but in fact it is about hidden Christians practicing their faith after being outlawed in Japan, risking death and punishment they would move onto islands at the West coast of Japan and merge with Shinto shrines to cover up any sign of Christianity.

Understanding this better I immediately had to ponder if this is special, and I mean, worldly special, and I am thinking no. I am also under the impression that this would open up inscriptions for e.g. Jewish hidden synagogues or Islam in a right-wing Europe if it ever comes that far.

Anyhow, Oura Church is 150 years old and was the site where missionaries discovered that they were Hidden Christians in Japan who have been continuously keeping the faith while the missionaries were banned. I find the church more of a symbol than an actual sight worth visiting. Inside one can not even find a church but instead a museum about exactly the same subject. For non-WHS fanatics I could easily say they can skip the is but as a regular tourist visiting Nagasaki it's one of those things to add to the itinerary without much extra work, plus it gives you …

Understanding the story of Kirishitan or Hidden Christian in Japan in the 16th and 17th centuries is mandatory to fully appreciate this nomination, strangely that in 1999 I have learnt the story of Kirishitan struggle after Shimabara Rebellion from 1997 Japanese anime, Rurouni Kenshin, after recommended from my friend because the story has many Dutch involved. 16 years later I arrived in Nagasaki and the memory from that anime especially the scenes of Oura Church vividly came back in my mind. From 13 components, I had opportunity to visit 3 of them, Oura Church and its precinct which including Former Catholic Seminary and Former Residence of Archbishop, Shitsu Church, and Ono Church. All are in or nearby Nagasaki city area.

I drove along the coastal road no. 202 for about an hour from Nagasaki to small village of Shimo-onomachi where the 1893 Ono Church is located. When I reached the church, at first I was really surprised to see that this small stone church hidden in the forest hill really looked like someone house, the white statue of Virgin Mary is the only sign that this is a church, but after looked closely I really enjoyed the design of this place from unique sliding windows and strange foyer, a really interesting piece of architecture. The 1882 Shisu Church was my next destination. Located in the hilly Nishi-Shitsumachi Town along route 202, this church can be immediately seen when I reached the town limit. Very different from Ono, the Shitsu …

Nagasaki offers a lot to see and we “lost” over an hour going through immigration facilities for a mere 10 hour stay by being bussed from our vessel to another building and then being photographed and fingerprinted! But, in the shorter time left, as well as seeing the atomic bomb sites, the old Dutch island of Dejima, the Glover Gardens, numerous Buddhist and Shinto temples and, of course, the various “interests” to be found in a contemporary Japanese city, we knew that we also had to fit in some visits to the T list site “Churches and Christian Sites in Nagasaki!

However, as Els says in her review below, the UNESCO Web site is very thin on exactly which locations are to be included. So, like her, we traveled “blind” taking in such Christian sites as we could find and as seemed likely to have “inscription potential” - however small!! On our return I carried out a more thorough Web search than I had done before departure and found this detailed Japanese site about the upcoming nomination http://www.pref.nagasaki.jp/s_isan/index.html (definitely have a look at the 10 minute movie).

So, it turns out that there are 26 locations, only 7 of which are in Nagasaki City – and 3 of those are really in the same location at Oura. The other 19 are spread around Nagasaki Prefecture with 7 on the Goto Islands. Of the 7 in Nagasaki City we took in 5 during our day whilst fitting in all …

Nagasaki seems to have missed out on getting in early on the List, and will have a tough time making it now. Hiroshima has beaten it on the 'Peace'-theme, and I'm afraid Macao has done so on the 'European influences'-theme. So they're now aiming for the 'Christian'-theme, which has already 100 sites on the List!

During my stay in the city in 2000 I visited Glover Garden, Dejima, the local Chinatown, the freaky Fukusai-ji Zen-temple, the temple route between Kofuku-ji and Sofuku-ji, the Urakami Atomic Bomb museum, and (yes!) Oura Church. This probably is one of the proposed 'Churches and Christian Sites in Nagasaki', although you can't be sure as the sites are not named in the nomination file. Oura Church is a 19th-century catholic church with, according to my travel diary, 'beautiful stained glass windows'.