Sacrilege: Japanese State Violating the Sacred

Dissolution order threatens sacred grounds: Believers regard likely move by authorities to erase cemeteries as sacrilege

Tokyo, 21st May 2025 – Published as an article in the Japanese newspaper Sekai Nippo. Republished with permission. Translated from Japanese. Original article. 

“My Mother Lives in the Afterlife”

The Request to Dissolve the Family Federation and the Cemetery Controversy (Part 2)

by the Religious Freedom Investigative Team of the editorial department of Sekai Nippo

See part 1: Japan: Even Dead Souls Face State Persecution

See part 3: Gross State Interference in Religious Matters

See also Japan: Families Fear for Graves of Loved Ones

Oze, the largest high-altitude marshland in Honshu and famously known as the setting for the classic song “Natsu no Omoide” (Summer Memories), attracts hikers from all over Japan each year who come to see the beautiful scenery with blooming Asian skunk cabbage (mizubashō), as mentioned in the lyrics. In Katashina Village, Gunma Prefecture – the Kanto gateway to Oze National Park – a Western-style cemetery with blue lawns lies peacefully in harmony with the rich natural surroundings.

This is the Oze Cemetery, owned and managed by the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification (formerly the Unification Church). The land was donated by believers over 40 years ago and developed into one of eight church cemeteries nationwide, holding a particularly special place among them.

More than 1,400 believers are buried here. A chapel has been built on the grounds to allow families to pray and pay their respects.

“This cemetery changed the way I live.”

So says Kayo Shiraishi (白石佳代), 35, a second-generation believer who was interviewed at Oze Cemetery earlier this month. That day, Shiraishi helped host a barbecue event where bereaved second-generation believers could connect and share experiences. Within the religious organization, the cemetery functions as a crucial community hub for believers.

Shiraishi’s mother, Yukiko Fukuda (福田ゆき子), died of ovarian cancer in 2009 and now rests in the columbarium (room with niches for funeral urns) at Oze Cemetery. When her mother passed away, Shiraishi was 19 years old and had rejected the Family Federation’s teachings. She recalls, “I was in touch with people who opposed the church, and I had prepared documents to officially leave.”

But her view on life and death changed drastically with her mother’s passing. Her mother, saying she “couldn’t die and leave her children behind,” endured a two-year-and-seven-month battle with cancer. When the cancer metastasized throughout her body, doctors advised the family that her final days would be better spent at home. Two weeks after being discharged, she passed away.

Shiraishi witnessed her mother’s final moments. Just past midnight, her father, Minoru Fukuda (福田実) (69), held his wife in his arms on the bed. As Shiraishi and her siblings looked on, her father whispered,

“You’ve fought hard. You’ve done enough. It’s okay to go now.”

Her mother nodded slightly and passed away. Shiraishi described the moment as “moving.”

“When I die, I want to die embraced by a loving husband like that. I want to be in a marriage like theirs.”

Though she didn’t fully understand the concept of God or religious doctrine, witnessing her parents together at the end made her feel this way naturally.

After placing her mother’s ashes in Oze Cemetery, Shiraishi and her family visited every month on the monthly memorial day of the mother’s death. The drive took about two hours each way, but to Shiraishi, who was deeply grieving, it never felt long.

“It was a mysterious feeling – even exciting. The car ride filled with memories and conversations about mom became a precious time for our family.”

Upon arriving at the cemetery, the manager – who was also a believer – would unlock the columbarium (room with niches for funeral urns) for them. The whole family would touch the urn containing the mother’s ashes. Their visits only lasted about 10 to 15 minutes, but they always ended by saying, “We’ll come again.” The manager would then offer them tea and sweets, and they’d enjoy some quiet, happy family time – a monthly ritual.

Though Shiraishi once “hated the church,” she eventually developed faith through these visits.

“The idea that we don’t become nothing after death or reincarnate, but that we continue to exist forever in the afterlife as individuals – that was comforting to me.”

Now married with a family of her own, she still gathers with her family for a meal on her mother’s death anniversary.

Government Undermines Believers’ Views on Life and Death

If the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology’s request to dissolve the Family Federation is finalized, the fate of the organization’s land holdings remains uncertain. Despite the unclear future of Oze Cemetery, believers continue to request to be buried or have ashes interred there.

Minoru Fukuda (福田実), Shiraishi’s father and a cemetery board member, expressed anger at the situation, saying the pressure to shut down even cemeteries goes beyond exclusion from society (ostracism):

“This isn’t even mura hachibu (村八分  – a traditional form of social exclusion). Mura hachibu excluded people from village life except for emergencies like fires and funerals – that was part of Japanese tradition. Targeting cemeteries through dissolution is an act of cultural destruction.”

While the government and courts claim that “freedom of religion will still be protected” after dissolution, removing churches as gathering spaces and cemeteries as places of spiritual refuge makes maintaining a religious community extremely difficult.

Shiraishi’s monthly cemetery visits were possible only because the manager was a fellow believer who allowed frequent access to the columbarium. If that is no longer permitted, it would mean being cut off from “conversations” with her deceased mother – an unbearable thought for Shiraishi and her family.

Looking at her mother’s portrait inside the columbarium, Shiraishi said:

“Losing this cemetery would be like having our home and hometown taken away. We’d lose sight of why we were born and why we live. I wonder – what kind of views on life and death do the people in government have?”

See part 1 Japan: Even Dead Souls Face State Persecution

See part 3: Gross State Interference in Religious Matters

See also Japan: Families Fear for Graves of Loved Ones

Featured image above: Kayo Shiraishi (right) and her father Minoru Fukuda appeal for the cemetery’s preservation in front of her mother’s memorial portrait in the Oze Cemetery’s columbarium – 4^th May 2025, Katashina Village, Gunma Prefecture. Photo: Takahide Ishii (石井孝秀)

[Editor’s note: Murahachibu (村八分) means “Social Ostracism in a Village”. 村八分 is a traditional Japanese practice of ostracism within a rural community. It literally means “eight parts out of ten”, and refers to the act of excluding a person or family from most aspects of communal life as a form of social punishment.

In traditional Japanese villages, ten types of mutual assistance were essential for survival (e.g., help with house building, weddings, funerals, festivals, etc.).

If someone violated social norms or committed a serious offense (like betrayal, theft, or disrupting harmony), the community would cut off ties with them in eight out of those ten areas.

The two exceptions (the remaining “two parts”) were typically firefighting assistance and funeral assistance. Even someone ostracized would still be helped if their house caught fire or someone died – because those were considered essential and sacred duties.

村八分 reflects Japan’s traditional emphasis on group harmony (和, wa), collective responsibility, and social conformity. Being subjected to 村八分 was extremely serious – it meant social death within one’s community, which in rural Japan could be more devastating than legal punishment.

While it’s a historical concept, modern forms of social ostracism (e.g. bullying, workplace exclusion) are sometimes still described metaphorically as 村八分.

村八分 is a traditional Japanese form of social ostracism where a person is cut off from communal life in all but the most essential matters. It highlights the power of collective norms and the severe consequences of going against them in a tightly knit society.]

Related to sacrilege by Japanese state: “Worst Post-War Human Rights Violations in Japan”

More, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Japan: Exhibition Exposes Horrors of Persecution

And more, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Japan Copying Faith-Breaking Concepts of China

Still more, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Japan: 4300 Abductions and Forcible Detentions

Yet more, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Deprogramming Abuses: Reasons for Japan’s Silence

Even more, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Calling for End to Japan’s Silent Complicity

And more, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Japanese Government Rejects UN Investigation

And yet more, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: 2024: Why Doesn’t Japan Accept UN Visit?

Related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Courts Using Debunked Concepts Against Minority

Also related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Dissolution Case: Wild Claims, Illegal Actions

And also related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Terms from Consumer Law Used to Rob Faith

Also related to sacrilege by Japanese state: 2nd-Generation Members Protesting Persecution

Yet more, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Inhuman Government-Supported Mass Deprogramming

And also related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Bias: No Right to Respond for Religious Minority

More, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Collusion to Rob Minority of Its Rights

And more, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: State and Media Creating “Today’s Non-Citizens”

Still more, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Japan Criticized for Glaring Rights Violations

Even more, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Two European Scholars Warning Japan

And yet more, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Japan Censured at Religious Freedom Event

And still more, related to sacrilege by Japanese state: Lawyer Exposes Dirty Leftwing Plot