From 1639 the Tokugawa Shogunate closed the country to the rest of the world and only in Nagasaki was trade with Portugal allowed(Sakoku-isolationist foreign policy).
Spread across the country, several Christian communities existed, but after the ban, they disappeared over the years and remained clandestinely only in the vicinity of Nagasaki.
Among these hidden Christians in Nagasaki, there was a prophecy of a preacher named Bastian, who was captured and martyred by the shogunate in the early Edo period (1603–1867).
This treaty led the Shogunate to open several Japanese ports and offer the land to make French settlements.
The treaty was unequal and unfavourable to the Japanese side in a number of respects, like extraterritorial jurisdiction, no tariff autonomy, MFN treatment.
There was a reason why Petitjean opened the church, which was originally built for the French residents, to curious Japanese visitors and allowed them to see it.
One woman, whose name is "Yuri" age 52, came to close to the father Petitjean and said, "Our heart (faith) is same as yours" as well as "Where is the statue of Santa Maria?"
From then on, leaders of the congregation living not only in Urakami, but also in Sotome, Goto, Amakusa and Chikugo-Imamura visited Father Petitjean one after another and asked for his guidance.
September 21(old calendar: August 24), Leon Roche, the French Minister who had lodged a formal protest, and Shogun Yoshinobu Tokugawa met at Osaka Castle, and they discussed the incident.
When the ban on Christianity was again confirmed in Article 3 of the 'Five Advocates' and the notice presented on April 7 (old calendar: March 15) by the new government, Sawa and Inoue called the Urakami congregation in question and persuaded them, but found that they had no intention of converting.
On May 17 (old calendar: April 25), after receiving a proposal from Sawa and Inoue for severe punishment of 'execution of the central figure and exile of the general congregation', the government held an Imperial Council in Osaka to discuss the matter.
The issue of the Urakami congregation was discussed for six-hour between British Minister Harry Parkes and other government representatives, including Shigenobu Ōkuma.
Families were split up, and in total 3,414 Christian men, women, and children were sent into exile to twenty different regions in Japan: 500 to Kanazawa, 160 to Tsuwano, 375 to Satsuma,[9] 117 to Tsuru Shima, Okayama, etc.
Their main objective was to learn about Western civilisation and modern systems, while the other was to pursue preliminary negotiations for the revision of unequal treaties.
As part of the preliminary negotiations for the revision of the Treaty of Inequality, Iwakura was severely criticised by various countries for the inhuman treatment and large-scale capture of Christians in the Nagasaki Bay area, which was then underway, and forced to recognise religious freedom in Japan.
In particular, US President Ulysses S. Grant, Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, and King Christian IX of Denmark had a great influence on them.
These criticisms made the delegates of the mission aware that the suppression of Christianity by the Meiji Government was the greatest obstacle to the revision of the Treaty of Inequality.
Finally the Imperial Constitution of Japan, promulgated in 1889 (22nd year of Meiji), subsequently guaranteed freedom of religion by the State.
[14] In a corner of the Urakami Tenshudo complex, there is a 'torture stone' on which believers who were exiled to Hagi, Yamaguchi Prefecture, were made to sit and forced to apostatise.
It is believed to be a torture stone that Genshichi Teramoto, a prison chief, brought back to his home as a memorial for the dead.
The stone was blessed by Cardinal José Saraiva Martins, who was in Nagasaki on behalf of the Pope for the beatification of Peter Kibe and 187 martyrs(1603–1639) on the following 24th.
[15] To Kagoshima (former Satsuma domain), 375 people were placed on board the ‘Heiwa Maru’ and deported at the end of 1869 (the second year of the Meiji era).
In addition, 58 people who died of illness during their stay were buried in the ‘Christian Cemetery’ on the hillside of the ruins of Fukusho-ji Temple.
“Hidden Christian Sites in Nagasaki and the Amakusa Region” was inscripted on UNESCO's World Heritage List in July 2018.