In central Tokyo: A church under siege tries to find a way forward

TOKYO — The church sits on a side street just a few minutes’ walk from Tokyo’s bustling Shibuya district, home to one of the world’s busiest rail stations, one of the world’s busiest pedestrian intersections and a poignant statue of the famously faithful dog, Hachiko.

Even early on Sunday morning, Shibuya is coming alive with throngs of young pedestrians. Once off the main street, things are calm.

The congregants arrive at the church, singles and couples, in their Sunday best. After being greeted by a desk of jovial matrons, they file into the chapel, quietly greet friends and take their seats.

The service begins. Hymns are sung, heads bow in prayer. From the altar, pastor Kazuki Watanabe delivers a sermon on repentance.  Most of the 200 or so worshippers listen intently; some jot down notes. In the rear pews, a couple of elderly gentlemen nod off.

The service concludes with modest servings of altar wine.

Save for the Asian faces and the Japanese language, the scene is almost identical to that seen in churches across America, from Pacific Coast to Atlantic Coast, on any given Sunday.

Almost. It is a Christian church, but no crosses are displayed. The portraits on the wall are not of Jesus Christ but of the church’s founding couple. At the entrance sits a burly man wearing a security armband.

This is the South Tokyo Parish of the Unification Church, an embattled religion facing what church officials say is a multipronged political, legal and media onslaught.

Attack on all fronts

In 2022, Japan’s longest-serving postwar prime minister, Shinzo Abe, was assassinated at a campaign event by an activist infuriated by his connections to the Unification Church. It was not just Mr. Abe — 179 lawmakers of his long-ruling conservative Liberal Democratic Party were found to have similar ties.

The church, one arm of which is the parent company of the Washington Times and formally known here as the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, never hid its anti-communist mission. For years, it assisted LDP conservatives with electioneering. That is not illegal. The party’s coalition partner, Komeito, is an avowedly Buddhist party.

Although charges that the church had curried political favor with the LDP swiftly proved unfounded, then-Prime Minister Fumio Kishida — whose party faction was aligned against Abe’s — demanded that LDP members slash ties with the church.

Meanwhile, forces on both sides of the political spectrum — hard rightists who despised the church’s Korean roots, leftists who despised its conservatism — allied with alienated former members of the church and went to work.

Many media accusations concerned practices that church officials said had ended years, even decades, earlier, including demands for huge donations from church members and the sales of expensive spiritual totems.

More damaging, a major legal effort still being pursued in motion could dissolve the church nationwide.

Worshippers in Shibuya know their days as a religious community may be numbered. They want to talk.

Dismay and hope

At the Shibuya Unification Church, one convivial congregant, Norishige Kondo, talked about the persecution of Jesus Christ and the harassment the late Rev. Sun-myung Moon and his wife, Hak Ja Han Moon, have endured since founding the church.

Both founders are Koreans, and in Japan, Koreans have faced prejudice. Mr. Kondo is intimately familiar with the prejudices the church has long suffered.

After he married in one of the church’s famous mass weddings, his family cut him off. He ceased using their surname and instead adopted his wife’s.

Only after the couple had a daughter, now in her 20s, did his family come around and familial harmony was restored.

Nowadays, it is rare for Mr. Kondo to join his wife at the Sunday service. He usually logs in online because, as the church’s deputy legal director, he is a busy man.

The door security guard is a “necessity,” he explained, citing recent threats.

A man exposed himself outside the church, vans of extreme right-wingers have blared abusive loudspeaker messages, and anonymous emails have threatened to kill believers.

“We need to defend our church,” Mr. Kondo said.

Rina Yamaguchi, 25, the daughter of two worshippers and a staffer in training at the church, said she felt “desperation” at the situation.

“My roots are in our church, so when it is denied, I also feel denied,” she said. “I was a university student [in 2022], and my professor, who knew my faith, worried, saying, ‘Are you going to have a job in your church?’”

Negative articles in the press have crippled long-sustained charitable activities conducted by the church and its affiliates. One worshipper, diminutive 77-year-old Haru Goto, described herself as “fiercely angry.”

“I’ve been supporting activities in Somalia for more than 40 years,” she said. “But due to media reports about dissolution litigation, people could not join our activities. It’s had a great impact.”

Church members say hostility toward their faith has been growing. Lamenting formerly friendly neighbors’ changed attitudes toward her after Abe’s assassination, Ms. Goto’s eyes briefly filled with tears.

“I tried to rent facilities — hotels and public halls — to hold an assembly on religious freedom,” said Kentaro Hatakeyama, 74, who engages in outreach to other religious organizations. “At first, staff permitted it, but later canceled it after investigating the relationship between the organization and the church.”

If the church is dissolved and its property sold, Unification Church leaders say, converting to a “home church” movement would be challenging because of the small size of urban Japanese housing and widespread public ill feeling.

“Community is very important, and the place for a community to gather is very important,” said Mr. Hatakeyama. “My house is not very large. … If we lose our church buildings, it will be very difficult to rent facilities. … [Owners] will refuse to rent out.”

The congregants acknowledge pessimism about the future, but a distant new hope has appeared in the capital of Japan’s largest ally and investor.

“Donald Trump has a policy to cut down anti-Christian movements,” said Ms. Yamaguchi. “I feel hope that opinion overseas will influence the Japanese government.”