Silence

This 1966 book by Japanese author Shusako Endo reads like a theological thriller. It tells a very graphic story of two Jesuit priests who go to Japan in 1640 in search of their former teacher and superior who has apparently apostatized and disappeared. Christianity was banned in Japan from 1614 to 1853. They will be at extreme personal risk should they go there.

And of course they go and are caught after a Judas type figure they had befriended turns them in. They are locked up after ministering to local Catholics who were worshiping in secret ever since St. Francis Xavier landed there in 1549. The story explains in graphic detail how these poor Christian peasants were tortured unless they would apostatize. They were told to stomp on a fumie, a small image of Christ or Mary set on the ground, and to say that they renounce the faith. If they refused to do this, torture usually until death would follow.

One of the priests dies along the way and the other eventually meets up with the apostatized former superior. Initially full of disdain for him thinking that he had apostatized to avoid suffering, he is more determined than ever that he himself will never do the same and instead will die a martyr’s death.

However, he is put into an moral and theological dilemma by the crafty authorities. I will not tell you the details or how it ends. The principal question Endo explores is where is God when innocent people suffer and secondly, what does faith mean when God is silent.

Among the most difficult of questions to answer in the Christian faith. Endo leaves us with the notion that even though God does not intervene to change outcomes, He still maybe present in compassion, weakness and endurance. And furthermore, mercy trumps faith in our lived experience.

Extremely controversial, Pope Francis recommended the novel as a serious exploration of faith under extreme human suffering. I rate this book 10/10. A must read for serious Catholics. There is also a 2016 Martin Scorsese motion picture of the same name that I would love to see sometime.

When Emperor Meiji opened up Japan to the world allowing Christianity in 1853, the returning missionaries found a large number of Christians still worshipping in secret there after nearly 250 years!