The Religious Exposition of 1930
With the end of World War II in 1945, the Second Oomoto Incident finally was resolved. The courts declared Oomoto innocent of the charges against it, and the government restored to Oomoto the grounds of the two headquarters at Ayabe and Kameoka. True to its role as a “mirror” of what was to come for Japan as a whole, Oomoto rose from the ashes, and the work of rebuilding began.
Onisaburo oversaw the recon-struction of the headquarters, beginning with the Stone Circle of the Moon at Kameoka, symbol of his otherworldly ideals. In his last years he lived quietly, producing a series of brilliantly colored tea bowls know as Yowan “Scintillating Bowls”. Yowan were the final legacy of his colorful and dramatic life. Unexpectedly, thirty years later, these bowls were to catapult Oomoto to become active on the world stage in a way which could hardly have been imagined before the War.
World Federation
Onisaburo died in 1948, followed by his wife Sumiko, the Second Spiritual Leader, in 1952. They were succeeded by Naohi Deguchi, their strong-willed daughter, who had guided Oomoto single-handedly through the dark years of the Second Incident when all the other leadership were in jail. Oomoto’s main activities under Naohi through the late 1970’s were vigorous involvement in the World Federalist and anti-nuclear movements.
Naohi Deguchi and the Arts
Meanwhile, an emphasis on the traditional arts had always been a part of Oomoto. Onisaburo once said, “Art is the Mother of Religion”. Naohi devel-oped the arts at Oomoto, causing a Noh drama stage to be built inside the Banshoden Sanctuary in Kameoka, and filling the Oomoto headquarters with tea ceremony rooms, practice stages, martial arts halls, etc. She also nurtured the growth of Noh practitioners and masters of tea and martial arts within Oomoto.
The groundwork laid by Naohi in the arts became the base for a new surge of international activities in the 1970’s. In 1972, sparked by interest in Onisaburo’s Yowan shown by Vadime Elisseeff, Director of the Musée Cernuschi in Paris, Oomoto sent an art exhibition on a world tour lasting three years and three months, and visiting thirteen cities in Europe and America.
Joint Worship Services 1975 and 1977
The Oomoto Art Exhibition featured art works by Onisaburo, Sumiko, Naohi, and her husband Hidemaru. It culminated in March and November 1975 with joint worship ceremonies at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City and Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. These ceremonies were the first in history between Shinto and the Episcopal Church, and their impact on the Japanese religious world was to be very far reaching.
In February 1977 Dean Morton of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine traveled to Japan to perform the “Kiss of Peace” at Ayabe.
This was followed in October 1977 with a ceremony led by Kyotaro Deguchi (Naohi’s son) at the Vatican, and in November by another Episcopal-Shinto service at Kameoka, presided over by Dean Rodgers of Grace Cathedral in San Francisco.
Subsequent years have seen Oomoto involved as sponsor or participant in numerous joint worship services throughout the world, from Mt. Sinai to India.
Kiyoko Deguchi The Fourth Spiritual Leader
Naohi’s later years were taken up by the rebuilding of the Choseiden, Onisaburo’s cherished Temple for All Religions which had been destroyed in the Second Incident.
Naohi died in 1990, and it was left to her daughter Kiyoko Deguchi, the Fourth Spiritual Leader, to complete the Choseiden, rebuilt in pure Japanese style in 1992.
Now headed into its second century, Oomoto continues to pursue, through arts and joint worship, the ideal of “Oneness” of its Founders.
