The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Japan

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Japan
Church logo in Japanese
The Tokyo Japan Temple
Area	Asia North
Members	130,251 (2022)[1]
Stakes	22
Districts	11
Wards	143
Branches	88
Total Congregations[2]	231
Missions	6
Temples	3 Operating 1 Under Construction 4 Total
Family History Centers	63[3]

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) (Japanese: 末日聖徒イエス・キリスト教会) was established in Japan in 1901 when the church's first missionaries arrived on August 12. Among them was Heber J. Grant, who was then a member of the Quorum of the Twelve and later became the church's 7th president. Horace S. Ensign, Louis A. Kelsch, and Alma O. Taylor accompanied Grant. The LDS Church's first baptism in Japan was on March 8, 1902, when Grant baptized Hajime Nakazawa, a former Kannushi (Shinto priest). The Book of Mormon was translated three times. The first translation, which took over six years, was completed by Taylor in 1909. It was then recommended that the Book of Mormon be translated into bunshō, a more elegant literary style, which was done by Chōkō Ikuta in 1909, shortly before it was published and distributed. The third translation in 1957 was done by Tatsui Sato. In 1995, the Book of Mormon was translated again into a more colloquial style.

Missionary work from the opening of the Japan Mission through 1924 was challenging due to language barriers and cultural differences, as well as the 1923 Tokyo earthquake and the Immigration Act of 1924. Few baptisms were performed during this time period. Due to these difficulties, the Japan Mission was closed from 1924 to 1945, until after the end of World War II. During the twenty years missionary work was halted in Japan, the work was moved to Hawaii to reach Japanese people living there. A small number of Latter-day Saints in Japan met together privately in their homes from 1924 to 1945, under the leadership of Fujiya Nara and later Fujiwara Takeo.

The mission was reopened in 1948 with Edward L. Clissold as president. Missionary work flourished after 1948 with the number of baptisms increasing, requiring new missions to be opened. The LDS Church decided to open the Mormon Pavilion during the Expo '70 in Osaka. After the Expo, baptisms doubled from 1969 to 1970. Two days after the Expo finished, the church's first stake in Japan was established in Tokyo in 1970. The Tokyo Japan Temple, the first temple in Japan and in Asia, was dedicated in 1980.

As of 2022, the LDS Church reported 130,251 members in 231 congregations in Japan,^[1] making it the second largest body of LDS Church members in Asia behind the Philippines.