Nagasaki

A High Pontifical Mass celebrated by the bishop of Nagasaki, Paul Aijirō Yamaguchi, on the ruins of the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, destroyed by the explosion of the American atomic bomb dropped on the city on August 9, 1945. The liturgy was celebrated in June 1949 to commemorate the 400th anniversary of St. Francis Xavier’s arrival in Japan. It is worth noting that honorary deacons standing in front of the steps of the temporary altar are dressed in albs, not surplices or rochets.