Japan Evangelical Lutheran Resurrection Church

A Postwar Church by Vories

The Japan Evangelical Lutheran Resurrection Church (日本福音ルーテル復活教会) is a small timber church of 1953 in Tokugawacho, Higashi Ward, Nagoya City, Aichi Prefecture, and was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property (structure) on August 13, 2012 (Agency for Cultural Affairs).

The Agency records a timber building, mostly single-storey with a 2-storey part and a spire, slate-roofed, with a building area of 177 square metres, altered in 1960; registration number 23-0345.

A Church Rebuilt after the War

According to Higashi Ward of Nagoya City, the church was destroyed in the war and rebuilt in 1953 to a design by William Merrell Vories, the architect of many Western-style buildings in Japan; the ward calls it a rare Protestant church that keeps its appearance from the day it was dedicated.

It has a gabled slate roof, with a spire rising over the 2-storey entrance in the middle of the south front (Agency for Cultural Affairs). The walls are clapboarded below and finished in mortar above.

Why It Was Registered

The Agency notes the scissor-truss roof exposed over the single nave and the cross-shaped window above the chancel on the west, and calls it a small church of clear design; it was registered as a model of design.

What to Look For

Look for the spire over the south entrance and the walls clapboarded below and plastered above (Agency for Cultural Affairs). Inside, note the scissor trusses and the cross-shaped window above the chancel.

Visiting

It is a working church owned by the Japan Evangelical Lutheran Church (Agency for Cultural Affairs). The building has been opened during cultural walking events organised with Higashi Ward, but no official information on everyday visits was found.