Sacred Places, Pilgrimage, and Tourism - Geography of Religion in Japan: Religious Space, Landscape, and Behavior - page 187

approved by the Catholic Church, and the church helped promote tourism in
Nagasaki. The proposed specifi c action policy includes the need to select pilgrim-
age sites in cooperation with the Catholic Archdiocese of Nagasaki, publicize pil-
grimage rules, create offi cial guides, create a Nagasaki Junrei Map (Nagasaki
Pilgrim Map), and disseminate information by holding events or through the mass
media. A result of this project is the pilgrimage guidebook Zabieru to Aruku-
Nagasaki Junrei (Nagasaki Pilgrimage as a Walk with Xavier), which was issued as
an offi cial Nagasaki Pilgrimage guidebook in March 2008.
The Shikoku Pilgrimage is one possible model for the Nagasaki Pilgrimage. The
movement hopes to attract one million tourists (pilgrims) in the future. The Catholic
Archdiocese of Nagasaki opened the Nagasaki Pilgrimage Center and assigned
some staff in May 2007. The center has taken several measures including dividing
the 212 pilgrimage sites in Nagasaki into seven districts, introducing model pilgrim-
age courses in those districts, and dispatching pilgrimage guides who are familiar
with the details of Catholic culture.
The Nagasaki Pilgrimage movement is set against political and economic
demands from local municipalities who expect pilgrimage development to increase
tourist visits, religious ideals and propaganda of the Catholic church, social back-
ground of the spirituality boom, and a growing interest in cultural property tourism
by the baby boomer generation as they reach retirement age. Most of all, however,
there can be no doubt that the inclusion of the Nagasaki Church Group in the
tentative registration on the World Cultural Heritage site list is a key driver.
Francis Xavier stated the Goto churches express the history of Christian accep-
tance, repression (hiding), and revival over 450 years since Christianity was fi rst
propagated in Hirado. Although all the churches are important historical and cul-
tural properties, they are simultaneously places of faith and life for Christians. The
churches are living religious spaces, not just historical relics. However, the Goto
Christians cannot maintain the churches, because the declining birthrate and aging
population have reduced the number of parishioners. Some church structures have
been damaged, and some are on the verge of collapse. Many people involved with
the churches expect that the valuable religious facilities, including the churches,
will be protected as cultural properties with fi nancial support from the national and
local governments if they are registered as World Cultural Heritage sites.
Other people have voiced concerns about the registration of the churches as
World Cultural Heritage sites. If the examples of the Gassho Villages of Shirakawa-go
and Gokayama and Sacred Places and Pilgrimage Routes in the Kii mountain Range
are any indication, a registration as a World Heritage site will dramatically increase
tourist visits. Tourism consumption has stagnated in Nagasaki since the collapse of
the bubble economy. Local municipalities and the tourist industry may regard the
Church Group as a last resort for tourism promotion. Will the places of faith be
violated by tourists? Will their cherished faith inherited from their ancestors be
showcased? The risk is that spiritual character of religious spaces as places to pray
and the lives of the people will be changed if the movement develops the churches
as tourism resources.