Vatican news agency Fides reported on November 8, 2025 that the Catholic Church in Japan, in collaboration with European religious groups, is set to establish a new pilgrimage route in southern Japan to honor the first Christian missionaries and the “hidden Christians” who preserved their faith despite centuries of persecution.
The planned route, called “The Way of the Gospel”, will serve as a spiritual journey similar to Spain’s famed Camino de Santiago, The Way of Saint James.
The general route of the pilgrimage will be between Kagoshima and Nagasaki that touches upon the sites of early Christian missionaries such as Francis Xavier, Luis de Almeida, and Alessandro Valignano. The pilgrimage aims to rediscover and enhance the spirituality and cultural and scenic beauty of a heritage invaluable to the history of the Church.