일본국헌법과 종교법인법에 본 일본의 종교정책⋅종교행정과 그 문제점

This study purposed to examine contemporary Japanese religious policies and religious administration and identify problems in them by scrutinizing the Religious Juridical Persons Act amended radically in Heisei 7 (1995), focusing on the Constitution of Japan and the Religious Juridical Persons Act, which are the core bases of postwar religious policies and religious administration in Japan. The basic spirit and idea of today’s Japanese religious policies and religious administration are derived from the Constitution of Japan (1946), and the practical operation of them from the Religious Juridical Persons Act (1951). These religious policies and religious administration, which are reflection on the prewar State Shinto System, are decisively different from the Constitution of the Empire of Japan and the Religious Organization Law before the war. It is because such policies and administration are the results of drastic reforms based on the three great principles the freedom of religious belief, the separation of Church and State, and the removal of supranationalism and militarism from the religious circle under the occupation policies of the General Headquarters, the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (GHQ/SCAP) (in fact, the occupation policies of the U.S.). The reforms were continued to Japanese religious policies and religious administration, the Constitution of Japan and the Religious Juridical Persons Act after the occupational rule. With the enactment of the Constitution of Japan and the Religious Juridical Persons Act, governmental authorizes such as administration and jurisdiction came to refrain themselves from interfering with religious affairs from the viewpoint of the freedom of religious belief and the separation of Church and State. However, it is also true that disputes among religious organizations, which had never been brought up, surfaced. Such disputes include the appearance of religious sects or temples demanding breakaway from their denomination for secular reasons and the birth of religious juridical persons that cannot be regarded as religious organizations. In particular, Oumusinrikyo created a historically unprecedented criminal group as a religious juridical person on the surface, and shocked the Japanese society severely by causing numerous troubles starting from indiscriminate terrors. In this trend that various problems involving religious juridical persons were surfacing, the Religious Juridical Persons Act was amended drastically in Heisei 7 (1995) in order to catch up with the trend. As the law is applied in the form of strengthened regulation,however, some people are concerned about its threat to the freedom of religious belief and the separation of Church and State. Paying attention to this phenomenon, we should make efforts to hold the basic principles of the Constitution of Japan and the Religious Juridical Persons Act, that is, the freedom of religious belief and the separation of Church and State, as well as people’s rights arising from the principles.