Following The Footsteps

     We, as a married couple, were sent to Nagasaki in May 1988, 8 years ago.

     We got the laying on of hands in Tokyo on May 15th, went to Kyoto with my parturient wife by bullet train, and reached Nagasaki following the trace of the Twenty-six Martyrs of Japan from there. 

     First in Kyoto, we crossed over Modori-bashi (Returning bridge), where we did prayer for a while.  Then, we went aboard a bullet train, passed following in their footsteps from Kyoto to Osaka, Hyogo, Akashi, Himeji and furthermore Okayama and Onomichi, and finally reached Mihara, where we got off and stayed overnight.

     Here’s the place where Thomas Kozaki, one of the Twenty-six Martyrs of Japan, wrote to his mother. He was only a 15-year-old boy, but was martyred together with his 48-year-old father Michael Kozaki. He was executed on the cross on the hill of Nishizaka, together with his father Michael Kozaki, a native of Ise province and a maker of bows and arrows. 

　Kyoto City (present)