AMERICA: A Nation of Religious Freedom?

Like most Americans in 1941, Japanese Americans reserved Sundays for religious, family, and sports gatherings. The vast majority were Buddhist, and from around 8 am on the morning of December 7, many on the Hawaiian island of Oahu were arriving at their temples.¹ At a Sunday school hosted by the Zen Buddhist-affiliated Nana Gakuen in Honolulu, eleven-year-old Chiye Sumiya was singing a popular Japanese children’s song, “Ame-Ame, Fure-Fure” (Rain-Rain, Fall-Fall), when the cheerful chorus was interrupted by a loud noise. Unbeknownst to the children, the Imperial Japanese Navy’s planes had commenced their devastating attack on Pearl Harbor. The next day,