Churches often reflect people’s hearts. White walls. A quiet inlet. Its reflection so clear on the water on a windless day. No wonder this church is called the “Water Mirror Church.” They say the people who built it wanted to create the most beautiful church in Gotō. What drove them to pursue beauty so fervently?
It was the Meiji Restoration. A new age was dawning for Japan. For the Christians, however, it did not spell their freedom. The Meiji government retained the shogunate’s ban on Christianity; the persecution continued throughout the nation. Among the regions most viciously persecuted during the Collapse of Gotō was Kiri, hometown of Yosaku Gaspar. Adults were not the only ones tortured; the persecution was such that even children were taken hostage while their parents were made to watch them be tortured, until they renounced their faith.
Eventually, after the advent of surnames, Christian locals were made to take on names that included the kanji character “shita” meaning “below” or “under.” The implication was that they were “sub-human.” The discrimination was carved into their very names. That’s why they prayed for more than the building of a church–they wanted a church whose beauty was unimpeachable and absolute. It went far beyond petty competition. It was a statement that said “You need not hide anymore. You need not be looked down on anymore. We are all free to pray here.” Perhaps they meant to represent that joy in the form of a church.
If you have the chance to enter it, be sure to check out the stained glass. Light dazzles in a myriad colors as it quietly falls to the floor. Its presence, too, is more than skin-deep; in the Christian faith, light is thought to represent the presence of God. Churches, then, are filled with light. Stained glass is also often called the “Bible of light”–in olden times, most people couldn’t read. Thus, art and light was combined in order to teach the Bible and make God’s word more accessible.
For over 250 years, Christians were forbidden to pray in church or see stained glass. Imagine their elation, then, when the ban was lifted and they beheld the light through colorful stained glass for the first time.
But that light illuminated more than one single path.