Why are increasing numbers of Japanese now turning to new religions? Because Japanese today feel they have nothing to fall back on. Even those who do not embrace new religions feel this way. That is why new religions continue to spring forth like mushrooms.
The Japanese people have lost their religious faith and their sense of ethics. Ethics is taught neither in school nor at home. People raised in such conditions in turn raise their children in the same manner.
Before and during the war, the Emperor was an absolute deity -- someone whom the people could place their hope in. But to the Japanese people's great surprise, on Jan. 1, 1946, the Emperor declared that he was not divine, and in doing so deprived the people of their first pillar of spiritual support.