The Heroic Conversion of Brazil´s “Japanese” Catholics

Foreign visitors to São Paulo are often surprised by the large number of “Japanese” they see. In fact these people are not Japanese but Brazilian citizens known as “nipo-brasileiros”. They are the descendants of almost a quarter of a million Japanese immigrants who arrived in the country between 1908 and the mid-1960s. Many of the earliest immigrants worked on coffee plantations in São Paulo and other states. They hoped to make a fortune in Brazil and return to their homelands after some years but, as was the case with so many immigrants all over the world, this proved to be a dream as they faced great hardship and never returned to their native land. As the decades passed, their offspring assimilated into Brazilian society. Many climbed up the social ladder and branched into other areas and professions such as agriculture, medicine, education and the law.

What is unusual from the religious point of view is that although the overwhelming majority were followers of traditional Japanese faiths like Shintoism and Buddhism most of their descendants gradually converted to Catholicism. It is estimated that nowadays 60% of nipo-brasileiros are Catholic and only about a quarter practice the religion of their ancestors. Others became Protestant or joined cults that mixed elements of traditional Japanese faiths with other religions, including African.

This high conversion rate highlights the tolerance of Brazilian culture as these immigrants were under no obligation to give up their ancestral faith even though Brazil was almost 100% Catholic when the first immigrants arrived. This conversion was usually a generational process, with members of one generation adhering to the original Japanese cult and younger ones becoming Christian, usually Catholic. Even today, almost a century after the first immigrants arrived, it is not uncommon for older members of a family to worship in Shinto or Buddhist temples while the younger generation go to mass.

One of the main reasons why this conversion took place was intermarriage with Brazilian and other immigrant groups such as Italians, Spaniards and Portuguese who were generally Catholic. Despite this, conversions were also common within families of pure Japanese descent who wanted to become part of Brazilian culture. Many individuals also took a personal decision to follow the Church.

Another reason was the heroic efforts of one man – a Japanese priest called Father Domingos Chohachi Nakamura. He did not arrive until 1923, 15 years after the first wave of immigrants docked in Santos and was almost 60 years old at the time. However, he did not let his age rein in his extraordinary energy and worked tirelessly until his death in 1940. Father Domingos Chohachi Nakamura came from Nagasaki at the request of the Brazilian government to attend the spiritual needs of the immigrants. Many lived in closed communities in conditions akin to slavery and did not speak Portuguese. The priest himself did not speak Portuguese either but communicated with the Church authorities in Latin. He travelled across vast areas of almost impenetrable “mata”, often on horseback, in the states of São Paulo, Minas Gerais, Mato Grosso, Rio de Janeiro and Paraná. He said mass, carried out baptisms and other ceremonies and converted many of the immigrants, Buddhists in particular, to Catholicism.

He became the spiritual leader of the nipo-brasileiro community and was held in such high regard that a process of beatification was opened in 2002 by the Pastoral Nipo-Brasileiro association. Its religious and social activities include celebrating masses in Japanese and caring for older people. If anyone deserves to be beatified it is certainly Father Nakamura.

All of this is heartening but an important qualification should be made here. Like the rest of Brazil´s Catholics there has been a decline in the number of younger people who are actually practicing their faith. They may define themselves as Catholics but rarely attend mass. This highlights the need for the Church to make a greater effort to attract younger people as is happening in some countries like the United States and France.

In conclusion, readers may not be aware but Catholicism has deep roots in Japanese history, going back to the 16th century when Jesuits and other missionaries arrived and converted tens of thousands of Japanese. However, the Church was subsequently forced underground by the authorities and thousands were martyred for refusing to renounce their faith. There is no room to go into this fascinating story here but I would recommend Shusaku Endo´s novel “The Silence” which was made into a film by the American director Martin Scorsese and stars Liam Neesson. James Clavell´s massive novel “Shogun”, made into an excellent television series with Richard Chamberlain, is also recommended and is currently available on Hulu and Disney+.