How is Easter in Japan? Why don't Japanese people celebrate it?

Easter in Japan is not as popular as in other countries. Plenty of people have never really met it: no long weekend built around that Sunday, no childhood hunt that everyone remembers, no family table that only exists then.

Ironically, Christmas, despite being a Christian holiday, is widely talked about and celebrated in Japan, albeit in a different way. So why is it not the same with Easter? Why did one date become a season and the other stay a footnote?

Easter in Japanese is called fukkatsusai [復活祭], where fukkatsu means resurrection and sai means festival. The holiday can also be referred to as iisutaa [イースター], from the English “Easter”.

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Easter is unknown to the population

Christmas in Japan became quite popular and turned into a kind of Valentine's Day: lights, cake, a date night, a very commercial holiday. Easter never got that costume.

On the other hand, Easter has not become popular even commercially. There are still few products on ordinary supermarket shelves, and some Japanese people have no idea what it is about. Some even confused the English word “Easter” with “star”.

It is also not a public holiday. Offices, trains and convenience stores run on a normal Sunday. Christians in Japan are around 1% of the population — not the 5% older texts still repeat — so there is no national church calendar pulling the rest of the country along.

The date itself does not help. Western Easter Sunday moves with the moon: the first Sunday after the first full moon on or after March 21, so it lands anywhere from late March to late April. One year it sits at the end of the school year. The next, it collides with the first week of April, when the country is already busy with new jobs, new classes and hanami.

This holiday also did not work out well because Japanese people do not usually exchange gifts on commemorative dates. They already give souvenirs when visiting or as thanks. Even on Japanese Christmas, exchanging presents is not the main ritual.

The dates that actually popularized gift chocolate were Valentine's Day and White Day. February and March already handle the cocoa. Another holiday selling the same box in April feels redundant, especially when cherry blossoms are doing the seasonal work.

Growth of Easter in Japan

Interest is growing, slowly. Import shops, some 100-yen stores and hotel pastry counters put out pastel eggs and bunny sweets. Most of the time these shelves have an international connection, or belong to a large brand that already sells Easter overseas.

Tokyo Disney Resort used to run a long spring “Disney Easter” season — parades, eggs, bunny ears — and that is still the image many visitors remember. Theme parks and hotels remain the easiest places to find the commercial version. You will not see the same density on a regular neighborhood street.

Easter is basically a date to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Unfortunately the global version has become something commercial and full of non-biblical traditions. I personally find the connection of the holiday with rabbits and chocolates absurd.

Each country has its own way of celebrating. Some do not even eat Easter eggs, but other dishes. In the same way, I believe Christians in Japan have their own way of celebrating in church, without being pulled around by marketing.

Japanese vocabulary about Easter

• 復活祭 — Fukkatsu-sai — Easter
• イースター — Iisutaa — Easter
• ハッピーイースター — Happii Iisutaa — Happy Easter
• イエス・キリスト — Iesu Kirisuto — Jesus Christ
• チョコレート — Chokoreeto — chocolate
• うさぎ — Usagi — rabbit
• 卵 — Tamago — egg

Fertility Festival in Japan

The fertility festival people actually talk about in April is Kanamara Matsuri, the “Steel Phallus Festival” in Kawasaki, usually on the first Sunday of April. The festival is known for processions with large phallus statues, a wish for fertility and, today, a very public street party.

Easter eggs and rabbits also carry old spring-and-fertility symbols in Europe. That is a coincidence of season, not a shared ritual. Kanamara is a Shinto shrine festival with its own history. Fukkatsusai is a Christian feast that most of the country simply walks past.

If you are in Japan on Easter Sunday, the honest picture is this: churches will hold services, a few stores will sell chocolate eggs, and the rest of the street will look like a normal spring weekend. The country already has its April.