Word: shinto
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...neighboring islands, who were among the first to suffer, early on developed a way to preserve elements of their faith. Adopting a complex sham, they worshiped publicly at Buddhist temples, then slipped away at night to hold secret Christian prayer meetings. At home, they prayed overtly before Buddhist and Shinto altars, but their real altar became the nan do garni (closet god), innocuous-looking bundles of cloth in which revered Christian statues and medallions were hidden. For 2½ centuries, their fierce faith endured, but it inevitably also turned inward. Because their prayers and rituals had to be transmitted secretly...
...most controversial event of the three-day visit was a 45-minute meeting with Emperor Hirohito, 79. Rabid right-wingers, distressed that Hirohito, a former Shinto god, would deign to meet with a Vicar of Christ, rode about town waving a sign proclaiming POPE IS A BEAST. Some of Japan's 700,000 Protestants protested the meeting as well. The Pope's visit, they felt, would en courage a resurgent movement to elevate Shintoism to status as a national religion. About 70 others, including left-wingers, four Japanese Catholic clergy men and some Buddhist priests, accused John Paul...