Japan Press Weekly

Tweet

2021 December 15 - 21 [PEACE]

Religious figures take to streets to increase public support for JCP

Regardless of differences in faith, several religious figures on December 17 held a street speech rally near a railway station in a Tokyo suburb to increase public support for the Japanese Communist Party. JCP member of the Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly Tokutome Michinobu joined the rally.

Delivering a speech, a Buddhist monk of the Chizanha school of the Shingon sect, Kojima Kojun, said, “The fundamental idea of religion is to establish a society where basic human rights and the dignity of all living creatures are respected. In that sense, I found a striking similarity in the JCP approach of tenaciously working to protect democracy in Japan.”

Shibata Chietsu, a pastor in the United Church of Christ in Japan, called on passersby to support the JCP by saying, “Churches, as part of their relief programs, provide food assistance to people in need. Like us, at a time when economic inequality is increasing, the JCP is working hard to protect people’s lives and livelihoods.”

Hoshide Takuya, a pastor in the Presbyterian Church in Japan, said, “Religious figures pay careful attention to whether our society takes good care of its people. The reason why I support the JCP is that the party seeks to create a society which respects all its inhabitants.”

Shinto priest Okuda Yasuji noted that the move to revise the war-renouncing Constitution is gaining momentum. Stressing that during the prewar and wartime period, the JCP opposed the war even at the cost of party members’ lives, he appealed for the need to increase public support for the JCP.