80 years after the atomic bomb, Nagasaki replaces the destroyed bell of its cathedral

Nagasaki Catholics (Japan) have replaced a bell in the bell tower of their cathedral almost exactly 80 years after it was destroyed by the atomic bomb that swept most of the city at the end of World War II.

An international effort to finance the construction and installation of the bell in the Urakami Cathedral raised $ 125,000 in just over a year, funds that came from more than 600 individual donors, according to James Nolan, professor at Williams College.

Nagasaki was one of the two Japanese cities, along with Hiroshima, destroyed largely by American atomic bombs at the end of World War II. The city was razed on August 9, 1945, which marked the second and last time an atomic bomb was used as an act of war.

Last year Nolan told CNA “Ewtn News agency,” that the parishioners of the Urakami Cathedral managed to dig up one of the original bells after the bombing and save it. The bell was installed in the right bell tower of the Cathedral after its reconstruction in 1959.

However, the bell was destroyed and the second reconstructed tower remained empty for decades.

Nolan, a sociology professor who visited Nagasaki frequent Campaign.

For Nolan, your participation in the project is a personal matter. His grandfather was a medical director at Los Alamos facilities in New Mexico, where the atomic bomb was developed, and later traveled with a recognition team to Nagasaki and Hiroshima after the outbreak of the bombs.

The people “were willing to donate once they knew the story of Nagasaki,” Nolan told CNA this week.

“We reach our goal of $ 125,000 on July 15,” he said. The funds will cover the cost of manufacture, transport and installation of the bell, he added. “Raising the funds took approximately one year and four months. In total, there were 628 individual donations,” said Nolan.

Moriuchi spoke at the blessing ceremony on July 17 and “he was excited a little,” said Nolan.

Nagasaki Archbishop, Mons. Peter Michiaki Nakamura, blessed the bell that day and appointed it “Campana de la Esperanza de Santa Kateri”, according to Associated Press.

The bell will officially settle on August 9, eight decades after the parish was razed by the atomic bomb. Nolan indicated that it will sound at 11:02 am, the exact moment in which the pump detonated about 500 meters west of the church in 1945.

In the place of bombing, part of the wall of the former destroyed cathedral stands in the Nagasaki Peace Park. Meanwhile, in the reconstructed parish to the east, Nolan expressed his hope that the bell “generates the fruit of promoting hope, peace and solidarity among US and Japanese Catholics.”

In comments pronounced in the blessing ceremony of this month, Nolan said that American Catholics who learned about the destruction caused in Nagasaki “expressed pain, repentance, sadness and a desire for forgiveness and reconciliation.”

A person, he said, wrote to him: “That the sound of these bells continue to remember the people of Nagasaki our pain for what their people have endured and reaffirm our love and God’s for them.”

Another commented that the donation of the Campana was aimed at “healing the wounds of this war and moving towards world peace.”

Translated and adapted by the ACI Press team. Originally published in CNA