ROMAN CHRISTENDOM: "Fat Man"

Here below is that shocking picture of the ruins of St Mary's Cathedral in Urakami, Nagasaki, the sacred site of the Nagasaki Catholic martyrs of 1597, of their place of torture and execution, and the centre of Japanese Catholicism, deliberately targeted and bombed to bits by Irish-American pilots, among others, on the order of Democrat President of the USA, Harry S Truman, who later dishonestly pretended that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were "military bases", rather than cities filled with innocent civilian women, children and elderly.

Truman used to keep a sign on his desk saying "the buck stops here".

OK, Harry, the buck stops with you, too, for the mass-murder of innocent Japanese Christians. We may doubt that God was impressed by your excuses for such an astonishingly foul deed. So you think you're better than Emperor Hirohito? At least he only attacked military targets at Pearl Harbour! Tell that to the Marines, Mr President!

The ruins of St Mary's Roman Catholic Cathedral of the Assumption, Urakami, Nagasaki, after the "Fat Man" dirty Atom Bomb exploded near it, having been dropped by Irish-American air crew

Shockingly and appallingly, the "Fat Man" A-Bomb dropped on 9 August 1945 in the Catholic district of Nagasaki, a short distance away from Urakami Cathedral, was a "dirty" bomb which was deliberately designed to maximise radiation sickness, so continuing to poison Japanese Catholics even decades after.

Also shocking is the fact that many of the US air crew were of Irish-American stock, including the commander of the B-29 Bomber, Bockscar, who was Major (later Lieutenant Colonel) Charles Sweeney.

Other Irish-Americans included Capt Raymond "Kermit" Beahan, bombardier, Staff Sgt Ray Gallagher, gunner, assistant flight engineer, Staff Sgt Edward Buckley, radar operator.

2nd Lt Fred Olivi, regular co-pilot, may well have been an Italian-American.

The rest of the crew were Capt Charles Donald Albury, co-pilot, Capt James Van Pelt, navigator, Master Sgt John D. Kuharek, flight engineer, Sgt Abe Spitzer, radio operator, and Sgt Albert Dehart, tail gunner.

Ironically, some of the aircrew were Catholic and/or were raised Catholic.

The crew of Bockscar the B-29 that dropped the "Fat Man" A-Bomb on Nagasaki

As Robin Wright wrote of Pope John Paul II in The Washington Post on 4 April 2005:

"I watched him in Hiroshima lead prayers at Ground Zero, and then in Nagasaki minister to long-forgotten victims wasting away from radiation more than 30 years after two nuclear bombs dropped on Japan ended World War II. As he told us on the plane, he anguished over the fact that two Catholics had been on the planes that first unleashed the world's deadliest weapon."

It is a sobering thought, is it not? Catholics used to murder other, innocent, Catholics, blasting them to smithereens.

For what is the deliberate, foreseen, intended killing of innocent civilians in war other than murder? So are we taught by the Catholic doctrine of just war. Let us not forget it!

The smoking ruins of Nagasaki after the "Fat Man" A-Bomb was dropped

Equally shocking is the fact that Nagasaki is the sacred site of martyrdom of the Nagasaki Catholic Martyrs of 1597, St Paul Miki and his saintly companions, who were crucified for their Catholic faith by pagan Japanese.

St Paul Miki was born into a rich, military Japanese family who all later converted to Catholicism under the influence of St Francis Xavier SJ.

He was educated by Jesuit missionaries in Azuchi and Takatsuki. He joined the Society of Jesus and preached the Gospel to his fellow citizens. The Japanese government feared Jesuit influences and persecuted them. In 1588, Emperor Cambacundono claimed that he was god, and ordered all missionaries to leave Japan within six months.

Original Japanese portrait of St Paul Miki

Miki and his companions did not do so and continued to minister in secret. They were eventually arrested and jailed. He and his Christian peers were forced to walk 600 miles from Kyoto as a punishment against them and the Jesuit community.

Finally they arrived at Nagasaki, the city which had had the most conversions to Catholic Christianity. They did not lament but rejoiced, singing Te Deum to the glory of God.

There they were crucified, in mockery of Christ's own crucifixion, on February 5, 1597.

Miki preached his last sermon, Christ-like, from the cross, forgiving his executioners and calling upon them to recognise that he, too, was Japanese and no foreigner and that he had done them no evil but only worked for the good of his countrymen.

Alongside him died Juan Soan (de Gotó) and Santiago Kisai, of the Society of Jesus, in addition to twenty-three clergy and laity, all of whom were later canonized by Blessed Pope Pius IX in 1862.

As Robin Wright recalled above, Pope John Paul II visited some of the many Catholic victims of the dirty "Fat Man" bomb many years later in a Nagasaki hospital, many of them horribly crippled and wasted by radiation sickness caused by the "Fat Man" A-Bomb.

Japanese Catholic woman at prayer in the new Nagasaki Catholic Cathedral

These victims, too, were "Nagasaki martyrs", innocents caught up in a war not of their making and brutally maimed by the shockingly immoral actions of a thoughtless, sinful government.

Oh, man, what a foolish, arrogant, senseless, sinful creature you are! And even decades later you still idly and evilly defend your gross and horrifying sins. How can you be saved if you will not repent?

God forgive us all...

St Paul Miki SJ carries his cross to crucifixion

Here are the last words of St Paul Miki, crucified and lanced in the side at Nagasaki on 5 February 1597:

"The only reason for my being killed is that I have taught the doctrine of Christ. I thank God it is for this reason that I die. I believe that I am telling the truth before I die. I know you believe me and I want to say to you all once again: Ask Christ to help you become happy. I obey Christ. After Christ's example, I forgive my persecutors. I do not hate them. I ask God to have pity on all, and I hope my blood will fall on my fellow men as a fruitful rain."

St Paul Miki and companions, pray for us, for the innocent victims of the Nagasaki bomb and for the misguided men who dropped the bomb!