Defending the rights of Japanese citizens is a duty of Japan’s democratic government. It is not happening in the case of the Family Federation and other religious minorities.
by Marco Respinti*
Article 4 of 4. Read article 1, article 2, and article 3.
*Under the title “The Crisis of Religious Freedom and Democracy in Japan,” this paper was presented in different versions at conferences organized and hosted in December 2024 by the International Coalition for Religious Freedom (ICRF) Japan Committee and constituting a lecture tour in Japan that brought the author to speak at Bunka Koryu Kaika, in Hiroshima, on the 6th, at Tokyo City Vision Center in Tokyo Kyobashi on the 8th, at Niterra Civic Hall in Nagoya, on the 9th, and at ACROS Fukuoka, in Fukuoka, on the 10th.
A third point concerns donations.
In 2022 and 2023, laws and administrative regulations have been enacted in Japan limiting the possibility for religious organizations that threatens “public welfare” and do not enjoy “social acceptability” to solicit donations. They also make it extremely easy for those who have donated and left the group, or for the relatives of those who are still in the movement, to claim their donations back. Massimo Introvigne, a little bit satirically but in fact catching the substance of the regulations, has summarized them by stating that under the new Japanese laws if you felt confused when you donated, this proves you were under brainwashing. If you did not feel confused, this proves brainwashing was highly effective. If you still believe today that you donated freely, this proves you are still under brainwashing and your relatives may act to claim back the donation on your behalf.
All rests on brainwashing, again, and singles out certain minority religions as threatening “public welfare” and not being “socially acceptable.” Since there are no clear criteria defining these notions, what religions should be blacklisted in this way is decided arbitrarily by the government—or by the anti-cult lawyers advising it.
Patricia Duval noted that Japan signed and ratified the UN International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and is bound to respect it. “Under Article 18.3 of the Covenant,” Duval writes, “all limitations must be ‘necessary to protect public safety, order, health, or morals or the fundamental rights and freedoms of others.’ This list is exhaustive, and no other justification is permitted. ‘Public welfare’ is not included in the list.” Nor is “social acceptability.” Limiting FoRB of certain groups under these criteria is prohibited by international law.
A fourth point concerns second generation members, who are raised by parents belonging to FF and other groups deemed not to be “socially acceptable.” After the Abe assassination, Japan invented a category of “religious child abuse,” claiming that children raised in a conservative or “cultic” religion are abused and neglected in many different ways. The new category inspired guidelines published in 2022 in the form of Questions & Answers.
They are so broad that they threaten FoRB of many religions, not only the FF. Among behaviors considered as “religious child abuse,” there is of course socializing children into religions that are not “socially acceptable,” and this targets the FF. But also prohibited is preventing children from celebrating birthdays (which is typical of the Jehovah’s Witnesses), sending minors of 18 to confession if there is a risk that in confession the minor will confess sins connected to sex (which targets the Catholic Church), and counseling daughters minor of 18 not to have an abortion even in cases where Japanese law allows it for minors (targeting again Catholics, who oppose abortion in all cases, as well as conservative Evangelicals).
The guidelines have been ridiculed internationally when they regard as “religious child abuse” even preventing children from reading comics or watching cartoons their schoolmates regularly access, based on religious and moral objections—in a country that has been repeatedly criticized by UNICEF for allowing children to access manga and anime with violent and sexually explicit content.
Finally, it is forbidden to scare children by telling them about eternal punishment and hell, which not only targets most Christian churches but would forbid Japanese parents to take their daughters and sons to most European churches and museums, where graphic depictions of hell are common.
These guidelines may be laughed at, but they are used to argue that the FF, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, and even conservative Christians in general abuse and damage their children and may have to be subjected to limitations in their educational practices and face lawsuits for damages by the usual anti-cult lawyers. The situation is so dangerous that it has not escaped the attention of the United Nations, which rarely intervenes against democratic countries. In a document signed by four Special Rapporteurs on April 30, 2024, the UN denounced that the guidelines “may constitute a violation of the principles of neutrality and non-discrimination, as well as potentially contributing to further stigmatization and suspicion of religious or belief minorities.” They also noted with concern that anti-cultists well-known for their vitriolic criticism of the targeted groups had cooperated with the government in drafting the regulations.
This year the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion and belief, Nazila Ghanea, filed an official request with Japan to visit the country and investigate the post-Abe assassination FoRB crisis. “Bitter Winter” was the first international media outlet to drop on November 25 what in journalistic terms is a small bomb by revealing that “her request is officially posted on the United Nations’ website. Yet, the visit has not been scheduled, which means that Japan did not agree to it. Japan is a democratic country and one that extended a standing invitation to Special Rapporteurs in 2011, yet in practice each visit should be confirmed to actually happen. This has not been the case for the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief’s March 2024 request.” What does Japan have to hide?
For these and other reasons that I cannot peruse in detail today, the request for dissolving the FF in Japan is a blatant and unjustified act of aggression on FoRB in this country. If FoRB is, as it demonstrably is, the first political human right and the chief characteristic of a true democracy, the governmental request for dissolving the FF in Japan is a serious curtail of human rights and a blow to democracy: it is the dissolution of liberty. This request is accompanied, as I have mentioned, by a cluster of new laws and regulations targeting several religions and severely limiting FoRB in Japan. It is also accompanied by blatant acts of discrimination and violence against members of the FF, its allied organizations, and other targeted groups. They are bullied at schools and in the workplace, discriminated when they try to hold events in public spaces, slandered in the media, and put at risk of physical violence, including domestic violence in their families. I especially salute today the brave ladies and girls of the Women’s Federation for World Peace who, because of the relationship of their organization with the FF, have been abused in multiple ways. Even a school in Senegal they have supported with years of sacrifices has been stolen from them. You are our sisters, and your bravery and sufferings will never be forgotten.
Again, I am both a foreign national and an enthusiastic friend of Japan. I have no intention to interfere with its law and politics, and not a single word I uttered today, or before, or later, should be constructed as an attempt to go beyond my status of an observer and a reporter on religious liberty in the world. But Japanese authorities owe Japanese people truth at all costs. They need to study and follow the expert reports of international scholars, paying attention to the remarks put forth by genuine experts. Japan deserves it, the Japanese citizens deserve it.
Defending the right of FoRB of the Japanese people is a duty of the Japanese government and the mark of its true democratic nature. The violation of FoRB of members of the FF and other religions is injustice done to the members of these groups, to all Japanese people of every religious persuasion, including non-believers, and to the entire world.
The case against religion, not only against the FF, is in fact spreading in the country and “Bitter Winter,” as it is its duty, has constantly reported this alarming situation, be the targets the Jehovah’s Witnesses, or Evangelicals, or others.
I wish to conclude with the words of an urgent statement that “Bitter Winter” published on October 31, 2023, gloomily still valid. It was an appeal against yet another dangerous proposal, allowing the government to freeze the assets of religious organizations it seeks to dissolve, but its words apply to the FoRB crisis in Japan in general. It contains a reference to a poem that summarizes well the sentiment that all religions should maintain towards one another. We at “Bitter Winter” use it in public quite often.
“We call on Japanese politicians and courts to reject the proposed law allowing the assets of religious corporations against which a dissolution lawsuit has been filed to be frozen, and to reconsider the dissolution request, acknowledging the dangerous far-reaching implications of these measures and the permanent stains they would create on the international image of Japan as a democratic country respectful of human rights. We call on the democratic allies of Japan and the United Nations to make their voice heard as a voice of reason, freedom of religion or belief, and human rights. We call on all churches and religions that have a presence in Japan to speak out against the new asset-freezing law and the dissolution. No matter how much they can disagree with the Family Federation on many subjects, the new law and a precedent allowing for dissolution of religious organizations that only lost civil as opposed to criminal cases would threaten them as well. Remaining silent hoping to be spared by campaigns whose final aim is to impose severe limitations affecting all religions would place them in the position of the average timid German clergyman during the Nazi years, captured in the famous poem by Lutheran pastor and dissident Martin Niemöller [1892–1984]. ‘First, they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.’”
May God forbid that such a day comes for Japan.
Marco Respinti is an Italian professional journalist, member of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), author, translator, and lecturer. He has contributed and contributes to several journals and magazines both in print and online, both in Italy and abroad. Author of books and chapter in books, he has translated and/or edited works by, among others, Edmund Burke, Charles Dickens, T.S. Eliot, Russell Kirk, J.R.R. Tolkien, Régine Pernoud and Gustave Thibon. A Senior fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal (a non-partisan, non-profit U.S. educational organization based in Mecosta, Michigan), he is also a founding member as well as a member of the Advisory Council of the Center for European Renewal (a non-profit, non-partisan pan-European educational organization based in The Hague, The Netherlands). A member of the Advisory Council of the European Federation for Freedom of Belief, in December 2022, the Universal Peace Federation bestowed on him, among others, the title of Ambassador of Peace. From February 2018 to December 2022, he has been the Editor-in-Chief of International Family News. He serves as Director-in-Charge of the academic publication The Journal of CESNUR and Bitter Winter: A Magazine on Religious Liberty and Human Rights.
