A Maryknoll priest in Japan ministers to migrants from his homeland of Vietnam.
When Maryknoll Father Lo Xuan Dam speaks about his family, especially his mother, he recalls how his parents struggled to raise nine children in Vietnam during partition and war, and the role the Catholic faith played in their lives.
“I am not from a generational Catholic family,” says Father Dam, who grew up in the historically Buddhist country. “In my family, the first one who became Catholic was my mother.” At that time in his homeland, he says, “among many Vietnamese, there was still a biased belief that Catholicism was the religion of the West, and that meant the religion of colonialism.”
In 1951, amid the French Indochina War, with hunger and displacement under French rule, his mother embraced the Catholic faith. The missioner says she found comfort and support in the Church, which led to the baptism of her then-six children. After the country’s division the family moved to South Vietnam, where his father also converted.
Father Dam, the youngest of nine siblings, was born in Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City). When he reached sixth grade, his mother sent him to a Salesian minor seminary. “She wanted me to become a priest,” Father Dam says. He recalls that “in 1975, when the communists won over the whole country, they disbanded all the Catholic schools,” forcing him to finish his high school and college studies in communist-run public schools.
“I think the seed of the vocation was already there,” the missioner says. “The years when I grew up in Vietnam under the strict communist rule, it was very difficult in many aspects of life, so maybe, part of that led me back to the idea of a vocation.”
Since the 1980s, Vietnam has undergone economic and social opening while remaining under one-party rule. The missioner notes, “We are freer than before but we still do not have full religious freedom, because the government still tries to manipulate and control the Church.”
When Saigon fell, two of Father Dam’s brothers fled and resettled in the United States. His mother died in 1983, and he, his father and two other brothers migrated to the United States in 1991, under the sponsorship of his brothers already there.
“When I came to the U.S., I immediately wanted to find some place that could help me pursue my vocation, and I came into contact with Maryknoll,” Father Dam says. Many people suggested that he simply join a diocese, he says, but after living for 16 years under communist rule, he felt that the United States was “too rich, too comfortable” for him.
He was admitted to Maryknoll in 1993 and ordained a priest seven years later.
“I wanted to go to somewhere where people need me more,” says Father Dam, now 65.
During his Overseas Training Program, which gives Maryknoll priest and brother candidates experience in overseas mission, he spent more than a year in Japan learning the language and then six months serving in parishes in the Diocese of Kyoto.
“Japan is very interesting because in some respects, it feels familiar, because Vietnam and Japan are both East Asian, and we share the ‘chopstick culture,’ so to speak,” he says. Both countries are influenced by Confucianism and Buddhism.
Maryknoll missioners in Japan focus primarily on parish work, he says, although some have also developed social service programs, such as caring for the homeless.
In recent years, Japan’s aging population has prompted the country to open up more to migration, even though many Japanese are not culturally accustomed to it, he says.
In tourist areas such as Tokyo’s Roppongi district, known for its nightlife, many visitors attend Mass, while in the provinces most attendees are migrant workers who often do not speak Japanese or English.
Father Dam explains that Japan does not officially recognize immigrant workers. Instead, they are labeled “apprentices” who train in a trade during a three-year stay before supposedly returning to their home countries to use their skills. He disputes official figures of how many actually return home, adding, “They come here to work.”
Most immigrants do jobs that are known as the three Ds — dirty, difficult and dangerous — work that most Japanese are not willing to do themselves, he says. The country “needs millions” of low-skilled workers, he adds.
“The Vietnamese are the biggest group,” says Father Dam of the newcomers. Other large groups of immigrant workers come from China and the Philippines.
Father Dam’s pastoral work focuses mainly on the Vietnamese in Japan, whom he estimates to be about 10% Catholic, though official statistics are unavailable. It is not easy for Catholics to find a parish in Japan, where less than one half of one percent of the population is Catholic. With so few churches, Catholic Vietnamese immigrants form communities that welcome newcomers, celebrate Mass, receive sacraments and participate in special events. The missioner travels regularly to visit such communities and other parishes.
Father Dam notes that not speaking Japanese is a major obstacle to integration for Vietnamese workers — but many prefer to focus on working and saving money to return to Vietnam rather than fully adapting to Japanese society.
The Japanese population often sees migrants as problematic, he says. Yet the missioner agrees with what Cardinal Tarcisio Isao Kikuchi, the archbishop of Tokyo, said in a 2024 interview: “I firmly believe that immigrants are not a problem, but a hope for the Church. They offer the Catholic community a unique opportunity to grow, especially with young people, and to proclaim the Gospel in areas where there is no active presence of the Church.”
It takes time for people to change their attitudes, Father Dam says. He hopes the situation for immigrants in Japan will improve in the coming years and emphasizes that migrants are not just the future of the Church in Japan, but the present. He points out that the vitality of many parishes is due to immigrants, as young Japanese people rarely attend Mass.
Immigrants in Japan are primarily seeking faith and companionship, he says. As his own mother once found refuge in her faith, he hopes they, too, feel at home.
“They come to church also because they want to find compatriots, to find activities in their mother language, and they find companions,” he says. “It’s a great chance for us to do outreach, and we have a steady stream of people learning about the Church and becoming Catholic.”
This article is based on reporting by Adam Mitchell in Toyama, Japan.
Featured image: Maryknoll Father Lo Xuan Dam serves in Toyama Catholic Church in the city of Toyama, Japan, where he offers others the same refuge of faith that his family found in the Church. (Adam Mitchell/Japan)
