The bishop’s ‘fine tact’: the ambiguity, ambivalence, and relationality of Catholic peacebuilding from Hiroshima and Nagasaki to Flores, Indonesia during the Asia-Pacific War

Abstract

In the ongoing debate about the role of religion in peacebuilding, particular attention has been paid to religious attitudes toward violence as a locus of the peacebuilding potential of religions. In this article, I turn to the case of the Catholic Church’s ambiguous and ambivalent relationship to Japan’s war in the Asia-Pacific region. The focus of my analysis is an exceptionally well-documented case of four Japanese Catholic priests on a Japanese Imperial Navy-sponsored ‘religious propaganda’ mission to Flores, Indonesia during the Japanese occupation. The four priests, including two leaders of the Catholic Church in Japan at the time—Bishop Yamaguchi Aijiro of Nagasaki and Apostolic Administrator Ogihara Akira of Hiroshima—worked closely with European missionaries left on the island of Flores to protect the church’s interests against Japanese military aggression. This unusual case of war-time cooperation between civilians from enemy nations in the context of the otherwise brutal war in Asia offers a rare glimpse into Japanese Catholic Church leaders’ engagement with Japan’s war efforts. The article demonstrates tact as a self-consciously limited and yet distinctively relational mode of peacebuilding that capitalises on layers of ambiguity and ambivalence.

Keywords:

• Peacebuilding
• religion
• relationality
• Asia-Pacific War
• tact

Acknowledgements

This article is partially based on archival research conducted at the National Archives of Australia, the Sophia University Library’s Kirishitan Bunko, and the Sydney Archdiocesan Archives. Various key records were also provided by the Ende Province of the Society of the Divine Word and the Archives of the Japan Province of the Society of Jesus. I thank Lienntje Cornelissen, Brother Rufinus Rehing, SVD, Father Renzo De Luca, SJ, Archbishop Kikuchi Isao, SVD, of Tokyo, and Father David Wessels, SJ, for their kind assistance. Archbishop Emeritus Takami Mitsuaki of Nagasaki and the Ogihara family in Tsuruoka, Yamagata also provided me with access to important records. For their valuable comments on earlier drafts, I thank Aoki Eriko, Bubbles Beverly Asor, Michel Chambon, Luigi Einaudi, Matthew Evangelista, Tanya Maus, Miyoshi Chiharu, Nagasaka Itaru, Annelise Riles, Seki Koki, Dahlia Simangan, Matt Tomlinson, and Luli van der Does. I also thank the three anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments. Special thanks are due to Hara Makoto and Sakai Takashi, who made pioneering studies of the episode examined in this article: Hara Makato., ‘Indoneshia gunsei ka no Katorikku Kyokai: Furoresu-to wo chushin ni’ [‘The Catholic Church in Indonesia under the Japanese Military Rule: Mainly about the Island of Flores’], Kirisutokyo Kenkyu [Studies in Christianity], 57, no. 1 (1995), 25–39; and Sakai Takashi, ‘Furoresu-to no Katorikku to Nihon gunsei’ [‘Catholicism and the Japanese Military Rule on the Island of Flores’], (Unpublished senior thesis, Waseda University, 1980). Finally, I thank Erika B. Chen, Alexandra De Leon, and Amrina Rosyada for their invaluable assistance. In this article all Japanese names appear in the culturally conventional order of the last name and the given name.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 Quoted in Giovanni Panico, Apostolic Delegate to Australia and New Zealand, to John (Jack) Beasley, Minister for Defence, 31 October 1945, A1066, IC45/29/4, National Archives of Australia.

2 The Catholic Church is administered through the following geographically demarcated jurisdictions: archdioceses, dioceses, apostolic vicariates, and apostolic prefectures.

3 Frans Cornelissen, Missie-arbeid onder Japanse bezetting [Mission Work under the Japanese Occupation] (Steyl-Tegelen: Missiehuis St. Willibroad, 1949), 38; Jean Van der Heyden, Kenang-kenangan masa perang [Wartime Memories], ed. by Alex Beding (Ende: Ende Province of the Society of the Devine Word, n.d.), 8. The Japanese internment of Dutch missionaries followed the Dutch internment of German missionaries after the German invasion of the Netherlands in May 1940: Paul Webb, ‘“Too Many to Ignore…”: Flores Under the Japanese Occupation 1942–1945’, Philippine Quarterly of Culture and Society 14, no. 1 (1986), 54–70.

4 Karel Steenbrink, Catholics in Indonesia, 1808–1942: A Documented History. Volume 2: The Spectacular Growth of a Self Confident Minority, 1903–1942 (Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2007), 98–9. The SVD missionaries converted many islanders during the 1910s and the 1920s. This success in evangelisation was partially due to the Dutch government’s promotion of Christianity in order to prevent the further expansion of Islam in the colony: Steenbrink, 89. Education, provided by the Catholic mission, served as a key instrument of this policy: Steenbrink, 94.

5 Alex Beding, Solidaritas benteng iman: Kisah Kedatangen Seorang Uskup, Seorang Administrator Apostolis, dan Dua Imam dari Jepang, di Tengha Perang Pasifik [The Solidarity of the Fortress of Faith: The Story of the Arrival of a Bishop, an Apostolic Administrator, and Two Priests from Japan during the Pacific War] (Maumere, Flores: Penerbit Ledalero, 2012); Congregatio Imitation-is Jesu (CIJ), ‘Mgr. Henricus Leven, SVD: Il Fondatore Della Congregatio Imitationis Jesu (CIJ)’, 2011: <https://tarekatcij.wordpress.com/>; see also Jan Sihar Aritonang and Karel Steenbrink, A History of Christianity in Indonesia 35, Studies in Christian Mission (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2008), 247.

6 R. Scott Appleby, The Ambivalence of the Sacred: Religion, Violence, and Reconciliation, Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict Series (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2000); Harold G. Coward and Gordon S. Smith, eds, Religion and Peacebuilding (New York: SUNY Press, 2004); John Paul Lederach, Building Peace: Sustainable Reconciliation in Divided Societies (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Institute of Peace Press, 1997); Pauline Kollontai, Sue Yore, and Sebastian Kim, The Role of Religion in Peacebuilding: Crossing the Boundaries of Prejudice and Distrust (London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers, 2017); Atalia Omer, R. Scott Appleby, and David Little, The Oxford Handbook of Religion, Conflict, and Peacebuilding, Oxford Handbooks (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2015).

7 Chiharu Miyoshi, Toki no Kaidan wo Orinagara: Kingendai Nihon Katorikku Kyokaishi Josetsu [Going Back Down the Steps of Time: A Prelude to a History of the Catholic Church in Modern and Contemporary Japan] (Tokyo: Oriens Shukyo Kenkyujo, 2021), 130–50.

8 ‘Resolution for Peace: On the 50th Anniversary of the End of the War’ (Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Japan, Tokyo: Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Japan, 1995).

9 Katorikku Chuo Kyogikai Fukuin Senkyo Kenkyushitsu, Rekishi Kara Naniwo Manabuka: Katorikku Kyokai No Sensokyoryoku, Jinjasuhai [What Should Be Learnt from History? The Catholic Church’s Cooperation with the War and Shinto Worship] (Nagoya: Senseisha, 1999); Miyoshi, Toki no Kaidan.

10 Toshihiko Nishiyama, Katorikku Kyokai no senso sekinin [The Catholic Church’s War Responsibility] (Tokyo: San Paolo, 2000).

11 An important exception is Régis Ladous’s study of Paulo Marella, who served as the Apostolic Delegate to Japan from 1933 until 1948: Régis Ladous, Le Vatican et Le Japon Dans La Guerre de La Grande Asie Orientale: La Mission Marella [The Vatican and Japan in the Greater East Asia War: The Marella Mission] (En Collaboration Avec Pierre Blanchard), Pages d’histoire (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 2010).

12 Henricus Leven, Misi Flores Selama Perang Pasifik dan Di Bawah Pemerintahan Jepang [The Flores Mission during the Pacific War and under Japanese Rule], ed. by Alex Beding (Ende: Ende Province of the Society of the Divine Word, n.d.).

13 Van der Heyden, Kenang-kenangan masa perang.

14 Cornelissen, Missie-arbeid onder; Frans Cornelissen, 50 tahun pendidikan imam di Flores, Timor dan Bali [50 Years of Seminary Education in Flores, Timor, and Bali] (Ende, Flores: Percetakan Offset Arnoldus, 1978).

15 Aijiro Yamaguchi, ‘Nanpo-ki’ [‘A record of a trip to the South’] Koe 825 (June 1946), 21–25.

16 Akira Ogihara, Senso to Shukyo: Fushigina Setsuri [War and Religion: Curious Providence] (Tokyo: Shinyu-sha, 1966); Akira Ogihara, Inochibiroi [My Narrow Escape from Death] (Tokyo: Shinyusha, 1979); Akira Ogihara, Watashi no Enikki: Nanposhoto wo Megutte [My Picture Diary: My Trip around Southern Islands] (Tokyo: Shinyu-shuppan, 1984).

17 Tasuku Sato, Hana no Koto [The Lonely Island of Flowers], (Tokyo: Shinyusha, 1961); Mark Tennien and Captain Tasuku Sato, I Remember Flores (New York: Farrar, Straus, and Cudahy, 1957).

18 Tokyo 12 Channel Hodobu, ‘Shinpu to Senso to: Minami no Shima Furoresu no Kiroku’ [‘The Priests and the War: A Record of the Southern Island of Flores’], in Shogen Watashi no Showa-shi. 4. Taiheiyo-senso Koki (Witnesses: My History of the Showa Era. Volume 4. The Late Period of the Pacific War), (Tokyo: Gakugei Shorin, 1967), 44–55.

19 Steenbrink, 143–50. For ethnographic analyses of the dynamic relationship between Catholic dogmas and customary practices in various regions of Flores: Catherine Allerton, ‘Static Crosses and Working Spirits: Anti-Syncretism and Agricultural Animism in Catholic West Flores’, Anthropological Forum 19, no. 3 (2009), 271–87; Maribeth Erb, ‘Stealing Women and Living in Sin: Adaptation and Conflict in Morals and Customary Law in Rembong, Northeastern Manggarai’, Anthropos 86 (1991), 59–73; Andrea K. Molnar, ‘Christianity and Traditional Religion among the Hoga Sara of West-Central Flores’, Anthropos 92 (1997), 393–408.

20 Appleby, The Ambivalence of the Sacred, 29 (emphasis removed).

21 Appleby, 306–7.

22 Atalia Omer, ‘Religious Peacebuilding: The Exotic, the Good, and the Theatrical’, in Omer et al., The Oxford Handbook of Religion, Conflict, and Peacebuilding, 4.

23 John D. Brewer, Gareth I. Higgins and Francis Teeney, ‘Religion and Peacemaking: A Conceptualization’, Sociology 44, no. 6 (2010), 1019–37.

24 Ibid.

25 The Japanese military divided Indonesia into three different areas for administrative purposes: Java, Sumatra, and the rest. The Japanese Army administered the first two while the Navy administered the rest, including the Lesser Sunda Islands: Waseda Daigaku Okuma Memorial Institute of Social Sciences, ed., Indonesia ni okeru Nihon Gunsei no kenkyu [A Study of the Japanese Military Rule in Indonesia], (Tokyo: Kinokuniyashoten, 1959), 157–64.

26 Cornelissen, Missie-arbeid onder, 78.

27 Ibid.

28 Leven, 93–4.

29 Yamaguchi, 22–3.

30 Leven, 96.

31 Leven, 96; Yamaguchi, 23.

32 Sato, 63–4.

33 Cornelissen, Missie-arbeid onder, 81.

34 Waseda Daigaku, 243–4.

35 Yamaguchi, 23.

36 Marella’s letter of introduction, dated 20 July 1943 and written in Latin, was enclosed in Yamaguchi’s letter, dated 17 October 1945 and written in Italian, to Archbishop Norman Gilroy of Sydney, Box A1108, Sydney Archdiocesan Archives, Sydney, Australia. The text of the Ministry of the Navy’s letter of appointment, dated 5 August 1943, which Ogihara possessed, is reproduced in Tokyo 12 Channel Hodobu, 46.

37 The Japanese military had organised similar missions to the Philippines, Guam, Hong Kong, and elsewhere in Indonesia: Hara Makato, ‘Indoneshia gunsei ka no Katorikku Kyokai: Furoresu-to wo chushin ni’ [‘The Catholic Church in Indonesia under the Japanese Military Rule: Mainly about the Island of Flores’], Kirisutokyo Kenkyu [Studies in Christianity] 57, no. 1 (1995), 25–39; Wakako Higuchi, The Japanese Administration of Guam, 1941–1944: A Study of Occupation and Integration Policies, with Japanese Oral Histories (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 2013); Terada Takefumi, ‘The Religious Propaganda Program for Christian Churches’, in The Philippines under Japan: Occupation Policy and Reaction, eds Ikehata Setsuho and Ricardo Trota Jose (Quezon City: Ateneo De Manila University Press, 1999), 215–46.

38 Chiharu Miyoshi, ‘Katorikku Kyokai (Nihon Tenshu Kokyo Kyodan)’ [‘The Catholic Church (The Japanese Catholic Religious Body)], in Senjika no Kirisutokyo: Shukyodantai-ho wo Megutte [Christianity during the War: Issues Surrounding the Religious Organisations Act], ed. by Kirishitokyo Shigakkai (Tokyo: Kyobunkan, 2015), 58–60; Chiharu Miyoshi, ‘Katorikku Kyokai to Jinja Suhai Mondai: “Ex Illa Die” tai ‘Maximum Illud”’ [‘The Catholic Church’s Shinto Shrine Problem: “Ex Illa Die” versus “Maximum Illud”’], in Seigi to Heiwa no Kuchizuke: Nihon Katorikku Shingaku no Kako Genzai Mirai [A Kiss of Justice and Peace: The Past, Present, and Future of the History of Catholicism in Japan], ed. by Sadami Takayama and Keiko Hara (Tokyo: Nihon Kirisuto Kyodan Shuppankyoku, 2020), 109–34.

39 Yoshigoro Taguchi, Katorikku-teki Kokkakan [The Catholic View of the State] (Tokyo: Katorikku Shinbun-sha, 1932); see also Miyoshi, ‘Katorikku Kyokai to Jinja Suhai Mondai’.

40 Y. Kobayashi, Nihon Katorikku Shinto no Shina Jihen-kan [Japanese Catholics’ View of the Sino-Japanese Conflict] (Tokyo: Nihon Katorikku Shimbun-sha, 1937); Yoshigoro Taguchi, Manshuteikoku to Kyokocho [Manchukuo and the Vatican] (Shinkyo (Changchun): Shinkyo Tenshudo, 1934); see also Miyoshi, ‘Katorikku Kyokai (Nihon Tenshu Kokyo Kyodan)’.

41 Miyoshi, Toki no Kaidan wo Orinagara, 143–4.

42 Miyoshi, ‘Katorikku Kyokai (Nihon Tenshu Kokyo Kyodan)’; Michael Thompson, ‘The High Price of Peace: The Catholic Church and Japanese Nationalism 1926–1945’, Comparative Culture (Miyazaki City University) 13 (2007), 49–67.

43 Miyoshi, ‘Katorikku Kyokai (Nihon Tenshu Kokyo Kyodan)’, 62–3. The Religious Organisations Law of 1939 was promulgated to tighten control over religious organisations: Hans Krämer, ‘Beyond the Dark Valley: Reinterpreting Christian Reactions to the 1939 Religious Organizations Law’, Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 38, no. 1 (2011), 181–211.

44 Miyoshi, ‘Katorikku Kyokai (Nihon Tenshu Kokyo Kyodan)’, 70–1; Ladous, Le Vatican et Le Japon.

45 Cornelissen, Missie-arbeid onder, 78–80.

46 Cornelissen, Missie-arbeid onder, 79.

47 Cornelissen, Missie-arbeid onder, 78–80; Tokyo 12 Channel Hodobu, 52.

48 Leven, 103.

49 Ogihara, Watashi no Enikki.

50 Ogihara, Senso to Shukyo; Yamaguchi, 25.

51 Leven, 103; Yamaguchi, 25.

52 Cornelissen, Missie-arbeid onder, 82.

53 Yamaguchi, 25.

54 Yamaguchi, 23.

55 Cornelissen, Missie-arbeid onder, 82.

56 Ogihara, Inochibiroi, 36–7. My translation.

57 Cornelissen, 50 tahun pendidikan, 93.

58 Ogihara, Inochibiroi, 37. My translation.

59 Ogihara, Inochibiroi, 37. My translation.

60 Leven, 99.

61 Sato, 64. My translation.

62 Sato, 64–5.

63 Sato, 66.

64 Sato, 67.

65 Sato, 68.

66 Tokyo 12 Channel Hodobu, 48.

67 Cornelissen, Missie-arbeid onder, 93–4.

68 Ibid., 89–90.

69 Ibid., 93.

70 Ibid., 93.

71 Ibid., 94.

72 Martin Kornberger, Stephan Leixnering, and Renate E. Meyer, ‘The Logic of Tact: How Decisions Happen in Situations of Crisis’, Organization Studies 40, no. 2 (2019), 257.

73 David Russell, ‘Teaching Tact: Matthew Arnold on Education’, Raritan 32, no. 3 (2013), 124.

74 Theodor W. Adorno, Minima Moralia: Reflections from Damaged Life, trans. By E.F.N. Jephcott (London: Verso, 2005 [1951]), 34–6.

75 David Russell, Tact: Aesthetic Liberalism and the Essay Form in Nineteenth-Century Britain (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2018), 1.

76 Tokyo 12 Channel Hodobu, 48.

77 Katja Haustein, ‘How to Be Alone with Others: Plessner, Adorno, and Barthes on Tact’, Modern Language Review 114, no. 1 (2019), 21.

78 Tokyo 12 Channel Hodobu, 55.

79 Upon his return to Nagasaki in January 1946, Bishop Yamaguchi mobilised his personal connections that spanned the globe, including new connections he had made or had renewed through his work in Flores, in his effort to reconstruct the Diocese of Nagasaki devastated by the atomic bombing: Miyazaki Hirokazu, ‘Rekishi to eien no aida: Katorikku Nagasaki Shikyo Yamaguchi Aijiro no ketsudan to inori’ [‘Between History and Eternity: Catholic Bishop of Nagasaki Yamaguchi Aijiro’s Decisions and Prayers’], Hiroshima Heiwa Kagaku [Hiroshima Peace Science] 43 (2022): 13–35.

80 Daniel Weidner discusses Max Weber’s and Paul Tillich’s ideas of prophesy: Daniel Weidner, ‘Prophetic Criticism and the Rhetoric of Temporality: Paul Tillich’s Kairos Texts and Weimar Intellectual Politics’, Political Theology 21, nos. 1–2, 71–88.

81 I thank Matthew Evangelista for suggesting this point.

82 Johan Galtung, ‘An Editorial’, Journal of Peace Research 1, no. 1 (March 1, 1964), 1–4.

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Hirokazu Miyazaki

Hirokazu Miyazaki is the Kay Davis Professor and Professor of Anthropology at Northwestern University. He serves as a Peace Correspondent for Nagasaki. Miyazaki’s scholarship has focused on hope, futurity, and exchange, and his current research focuses on a variety of forms of peace activism in Japan and the U.S. Miyazaki’s publications include The Method of Hope: Anthropology, Philosophy, and Fijian Knowledge (2004) and Arbitraging Japan: Dreams of Capitalism at the End of Finance (2013), The Economy of Hope (2017; co-edited with Richard Swedberg), and Nuclear Compensation: Lessons from Fukushima (2021; editor).