Hundreds of people gathered at a memorial event in downtown Manhattan on Sunday, the first anniversary of the devastating earthquake and tsunami that ravaged the Tohoku region.
The interfaith memorial service for victims of the March 11, 2011, disasters featured prayers and chanting by the Rev. T. Kenjitsu Nakagaki, a Japanese Buddhist priest based in New York, and other leaders from major religions, including Shintoism, Christianity, Judaism and Islam.
The service at Judson Memorial Church was preceded by a memorial walk from nearby Washington Square Park, where a moment of silence was held by participants standing in a circle at 2:46 p.m., the local time in Japan when the magnitude 9.0 quake occurred off the northeastern coastline of Honshu a year ago.