I read with great interest Florian Coulmas' May 4 article, "Japan as a land of many religions," which was a review of the book "Prophet Motive" -- about the important role played by Oomoto founder Deguchi Onisaburo, founder of the "highly successful syncretistic sect" Oomoto.
Nevertheless, I was disappointed by the initial words of the reviewer that "the Christian mission has been remarkably unsuccessful in this country."
During more than 30 years of teaching thousands of students at Sophia University, I baptized only 32 people. That might appear to be an unsuccessful result. Yet, when you see what our graduates are doing in Japan and around the world -- like fighting for the human rights and welfare of all kinds of people in distress as well as striving for peace and justice in the political and diplomatic world, imbued, as many say, with the Christian esprit of Sophia -- the picture changes.
If, aside from the hospital and welfare institutions run by Japanese Christians, you take the Christian educational system from kindergarten to university, you see the influence -- from the very highest to the lowest levels of Japanese society -- of Christian principles and ideals.
Bean-counting is not the best way to evaluate a religion, but if you do it, do it well. The Oomoto home page states that the followers of Oomoto in 1997, roughly a hundred years after its foundation, numbered 182,613. The number of Christians, over a little longer period, is many times more.
I never thought, during my more than 50 years in Japan, that my life was either remarkably or otherwise unsuccessful. Perhaps the celebration next month of my lucky 77th birthday makes me unduly optimistic.