The idea that Christianity was a heretical religion was deeply entrenched among Japanese since the persecution of Christians in the Edo era. This discrimination finally disappeared after World War II. During the Meiji period, on the other hand, Christianity was assumed to be a symbol of Westernization, progress, and high quality, and was accepted by urban intellectuals. Research on Christianity in Japan has focused on doctrinal issues and the history of propagation and martyrdom, hardly ever mentioning the everyday life of the Christian people. In this essay I will introduce the daily faith life of Kakure-Kirishitan believers of Ikitsuki Island in Nagasaki, who represent a tradition handed down from the time Christianity was introduced and continued during the "hidden" times and through the late Tokugawa period. In conclusion, it can be said that the daily faith life of these converts does not reveal a radical break from Japanese views of the buddhas and kami, but rather shows an acceptance of Christianity as reliance on a "powerful kami." There is a strong tendency to maintain the belief in the magical to attain this-worldly benefits as a basic aspect of their faith.

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In the faith-life of Beguines, faith and occupation are exquisitely integrated. The faith of Beguines is connected directly with life. In the life of Beguines, faith bears fruit in daily labor. This life-style was a shining example in the Europe of the latter Middle Ages. I believe that Meister Eckhart had some sort of connection with the Beguines. Eckhart is a theologian who acquired a degree of Meister at Paris University, and later taught there as a theologian. In one of his sermons, Eckhart expresses his idea that education exquisitely integrates with life, perhaps revealing a relation with Beguines. When we compare this outlook on labor with that of the Bible and St. Benedictus Rule, the Beguines outlook on labor is clearly unique. The unification of faith and occupation in the Beguines is parallel with the unification of work in the wooden clogs craftsman Myokonin Asahara Saichi and his Buddhist faith. The faith of Beguines based on Holy Communion bore fruit in a way of live in which one worked hard and faithfully for one's occupation. But Beguines did not work hard only for their occupation. They also take a careful attitude toward activities in everyday life such as eating meals and sleeping.

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The fourth century was a turning point for the Church in the Roman Empire, when it changed from the Church for a devout minority into that for the secular majority. This study attempts to approach the transition through a religious figure who was deeply engaged with it: John Chrysostom. As a leader of the Church, Chrysostom faced a growing number of unprepared people rushing to join it. He did not urge ordinary Christians living in the world to escape from worldly affairs. Nor did he want them to live unsoundly. He showed a third way in which people could live religiously amidst very secular daily lives. Thus he tried to integrate religiousness with secular living. According to his thought on the relationship between religiosity and secular life, one must first turn oneself from things for daily living to things religious, whereby one should sanctify one's life. Then one becomes able to testify to religion through one's way of life.

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The usual theological discussions on the "indigenization" of Christianity lack gender perspectives. The aim of this paper is to reexamine the realities of "indiginization" in the local churches where women form the majority of the flock in the church life. The church women to be examined here are Dalit and tribal Mizo in India, and wives of pastors and Okinawa Christian women in Japan, whom the writer has encountered over a long period of time through field work and volunteer activities. These women are practicing their faith amidst patriarchal cultures and sexist criteria of various communities, including the church. How are they suffering, settling their struggles, or freeing themselves for their own empowerment? Though the spirituality of the women vary according to the contents of faith and phases of gender/sexual independence, this paper targets women who are spiritually friendly to others as a Christian characteristic.

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A practical dialogue is necessary for peace-building. In the case of conflict in the Philippines, the Catholics have shown much prejudice and misunderstanding toward the Muslims. Also, they have tried to conquer the Muslims and hold a dominant position over them. In order to build the peace, Catholics need to change these attitudes, deepen mutual understanding, and move toward conversion as partners. Moreover, it is important to have not only a theoretical dialogue but also a practical dialogue so that Muslims and Christians can deepen spiritual communication in their own religious life and uphold a genuine brother-sisterhood. NGOs play a most important role in this renewal through person-to-person communication and grassroots movements. Collaboration between all peoples of good will is essential for building peace. Dialogue is a spiritual journey, and requires patience and a long time. Many believe, however, that peace will be established only through this long process and the dialogue of reconciliation.

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This essay elucidates the possibility that the Catholic Church in contemporary Japan will realize the idea of a NPO (nonprofit organization) from a perspective of religious management. As in the former postwar period, the situation around the Church these days has brought some drastic changes, which I describe as a "livelihood emergency," capable of resulting in desirable transformation. The established parish churches and the communities around them are integrated into a church-community system. This system is now confronted with the rapid influx of foreign Catholic lay people, and must provide asylum that emanates from the principle of muen (Amino Yoshihiko) and "communitas" (Victor W. Turner). We also find there a kind of multiculturalism that reminds us of cultural relativism. Priests and religious members play the role of facilitator in the management of ba ("place"; Itami Hiroyuki) in order to adapt themselves flexibly to actual conditions. A priest in a church-community must be a collaborative producer who makes plans for many open events, such as participation in public actions to attain social recognition for his community. I conclude that the management of religion should be an art of coexistence.

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The Lourdes pilgrimages has responded in various ways to contemporary problems, while always referring to Christ. In terms of its response to such issues, the pilgrimage can be divided into three periods. 1) The offering of a story and rituals that confirm a common bond of "us" with Christ in the past, present, and future, in response to the collapse of the traditional community system; 2) the arising of a social bond between the rich "us" and the poor "them" through charitable activity based on the "acceptance of God's love" commanded by Christ, in response to labor problems and the collapse of traditional solidarity; and 3) the offering of a public place for people to meet and share private matters with regard to disease, old age, and death, in response to people who suffer from loneliness due to the hidden and private nature of such matters in modern medicine and society. In this way the Lourdes pilgrimage has passed through three periods, providing a story with the power to encourage participation, providing practices and a place for participation, and offering a model for appropriate relationships and activity that participants need to maintain.

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There are many people who never encounter Christianity until they become university students. In my class on "The Practice of Social Surveys" I teach introductory knowledge on Christianity and previous research concerning surveys on religion in the first term, and assign students to a group depending on their personal interests. In the secondterm, each g roup carries out a survey and participates in worship, and interviews believers, so that they experience something about Christianity. Among the university students who participated in these surveys, there was a person who went to church frequently as a child but then drifted away from the church, and said that this was an opportunity to rethink his/her personal faith once again. Some students who were prejudiced against Christianity said that this experience resulted in revising their views. As a result of this examination, it became clear that many of the students were indifferent or ignorant of Christianity. Therefore, as Christianity is still a minority in Japanese society, it is necessary to enlighten people concerning Christianity and have contact with non-believers, even if this does not lead directly to an increase in the number of believers.

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In this treatise I discuss not secularism, but the secularization of religion, which can attain a dimension where the polarity between holiness and secularization is transcended, and each one of us can attain oneness in our daily life. We who live in the first half of the 21st century must reflect on the beginning of religions in the contemporary world, and inquire into the meaning of original life from the standpoint of the experience that underlies all religions. In the 21st century we experience pluralism and complementarity, not only in the sphere of physics but also of religion, because each of us already understands that not only Christianity, but indeed all other religions-in which the self-awareness of each person is taken seriously as the central and most important issue-must go back to the beginning of all religions in the contemporary world and enquire into each of them from the standpoint of the experience of original life. The experience of original life or spirituality, which underlies all religions in this century, is originally one. Its representations (expressions) are very different from each other, because it is represented by the traditional culture of each nation, each of which has its own traditional and unique culture. In this sense I would like to inquire into the dimension transcending all dualities or polarities by comparing Christianity with Buddhism.

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