Christianity and Japan
In 1549 Francis Xavier arrived at southern Kyusyu Island, Japan, in order to convert Japanese to Christianity.
Since then for about a century, Christian missionaries were frequently sent to Japan from Spain and Portugal, acquiring hundreds of thousands of believers among not only farmers and townsmen but also samurai feudal lords. But samurai leaders finally decided to put an end to Christian movements in Japan, since Japanese Christians called Kirishitan started to show less respect for samurai authorities than the Vatican. The Tokugawa-shogun led samurai regime eventually cut off the diplomatic/trading relations with western countries, except the Netherlands, so as to prevent religious influences from overseas in 1639.
But termination of Christianity in Japan required a great amount of blood.
Christianity in JapanPut simply the sword was stronger than a version of Christianity those missionaries around 1600 brought into Japan. If a majority of the Japanese people at the time, including high-ranking samurais, had converted to Christianity, Buddhist samurai leaders might have been defeated in a civil war. But as a matter of fact, in the middle of the 17th century, almost all the Christians were wiped away from the surface of the Japanese society, though some Christians kept their faith under the disguise of ordinary Buddhists in a very unique manner, till the samurai regime fell and Japan opened the nation to start westernization in the late 19th century.
The shogunate and imperial government at first supported the Catholic mission and the missionaries, thinking that they would reduce the power of the Buddhist monks, and help trade with Spain and Portugal. However, the Shogunate was also wary of colonialism, seeing that in the Philippines the Spanish had taken power after converting the population. The government increasingly saw Roman Catholicism as a threat, and started persecuting Christians. Christianity was banned and those Japanese who refused to abandon their faith were killed.
On February 5, 1597, twenty-six Christians—six European Franciscan missionaries, three Japanese Jesuits and seventeen Japanese laymen including three young boys—were executed by crucifixion in Nagasaki. These individuals were raised on crosses and then pierced through with spears.
Persecution continued sporadically, breaking out again in 1613 and 1630. On September 10, 1632, 55 Christians were martyred in Nagasaki in what became known as the Great Genna Martyrdom. At this time Roman Catholicism was officially outlawed. The Church remained without clergy and theological teaching disintegrated until the arrival of Western missionaries in the nineteenth century.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martyrs_of_Japan#Petrus_Kibe_Kasui_and_187_Companion_Martyrs_of_Japan
But this record of martyrdom is really grave. In the period of persecution of Japanese Christians by samurais, it is estimated that more than 40,000 believers were killed by samurai. At least concrete records of death penalty are left for about 3,500 believers. This number of martyrs is said to be the largest next to that of Christian victims (about 100,000) executed by the Roman Empire.
So, Japan is the very unique country in terms of propagation of the Christian faith.
(As for the 2020 Olympics, Catholic Madrid and Islamic Istanbul fought without making concession to each other, resulting in Tokyo's winning in a race to be qualified as the host of the Olympics. Spain cannot support Islamic Turkey but can accept mostly Buddhist and slightly Christian Japan even in voting for choosing an Olympics host country.)
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Mar 9:8 And suddenly, when they had looked round about, they saw no man any more, save Jesus only with themselves.
Mar 9:9 And as they came down from the mountain, he charged them that they should tell no man what things they had seen, till the Son of man were risen from the dead.
Mar 9:10 And they kept that saying with themselves, questioning one with another what the rising from the dead should mean.