Granada

The Granada “Amache” Relocation Center, in the isolated Colorado prairie, required three days travel by train for most evacuees to arrive. Director James G. Lindley, a devout Christian man, was tasked with welcoming the internees to their wartime home. Lindley recalled that “trains arrived, usually at night; lighting facilities were extremely sketchy, and families stumbled around in the dark, individuals often falling into excavations when being led to their quarters. Candles, with their ever-present fire hazard in this city of cardboard homes, were their only light.”[1] “The evacuee residential section was divided into thirty blocks, . . . composed of twelve identical barracks, 120 x 20 feet, each of which was divided into six apartments.”[2] According to one young mother,

When we got there, everybody was shocked because there was nothing but sand and sandstorms and tumbleweeds. Not a thing to see. . . . Then the dust storm came. I remember my daughter disappeared once and I couldn’t find her and her little friend. I looked for them all over. There was a very religious young pastor—evangelistic type—and I looked in his church and I could hardly see, the sand was so bad. And I looked in and there I saw my little daughter and her girlfriend in the front row. . . . I heard him say, “You know when you get to heaven you’re not going to have all this dust.”[3]

Internal Strength

The Christians would not be daunted by the bleak conditions. As in the other camps, they quickly began to gather and established a constitution declaring the Granada Christian Church’s stated purpose: “(1) To worship God; (2) To propagate the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ; (3) To foster and establish the faith of the believers.”[4] They adopted the Apostles’ Creed as their statement of faith and established only two requirements for membership: “(1) To believe on the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior; (2) To be baptized, approved and accepted by the ministerial council.”[5] The church was then organized into ten committees with a chairman and vice-chairman for each committee.[6]

On Sundays, two separate services were held for the convenience of worshippers: one on the north side and another on the south side of the center. The resident ministers shared the preaching,[7] while ushering duties, heating the church stove, and distributing programs were divided weekly according to the pre-war churches in which congregants had worshipped. The choir, led by George Kubota, was also a great encouragement to many. Eventually, the church started a Wednesday night Nisei fellowship and ministries for youth. The Amache Hi-Y was organized in February 1944 with the stated purpose “to create, maintain and extend throughout the school and community high standards of Christian character,”[8] while the Amache YWCA had already begun in November 1942.[9] The Granada Christian Church News was distributed to “all the centers, any Christian leaders and churches and the University of California library.”[10] The church also set up a religious library thanks to the generosity of the Pacific School of Religion and various seminaries around the country.[11]

Early in the internment, Rev. Lester Suzuki preached a sermon entitled “God’s Gold Mine of Opportunities of Faith.” Like ministers in the other camps, he emphasized the church’s privilege to follow the example of her Lord Jesus Christ.

Suzuki exhorted the Granada Christian Church to take root in this desert soil where God had planted them against their will. He honestly addressed the injustice they endured, but urged them not to grow bitter in view of God’s sovereign plan. His text for this sermon was Hebrews 12:1-2,

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Suzuki recognized that his fellow believers were struggling through trials, but also with the weight of any sinful ways they responded. Thus, he called them to run with endurance like Christ who finished the race before them and empowered them to run as well. Christians were not to use their suffering as an excuse to do wrong or to hold onto bitterness. Instead, the internment provided an opportunity to reflect on God’s grace as manifest in their lives. For example, “On Sunday, Oct. 25, 1942, a Nisei Symposium was held with seven speakers . . . on the topic, ‘How Has the Past Six Months Effected My Christian Faith.’”[13] The church took great comfort from Psalm 121:1-2 as they cited George Adam Smith:

At least three hills in Scripture have their significant message for our souls: A hill called Sinai speaks to us of the majesty and necessity of the moral law. Another hill, called “the mountain,” reveals the divine Teacher giving us eternal principles, challenging to all who yearn for greater heights of moral and spiritual perfection in Christ. And from a hill called Calvary come the redeeming power and grace to make possible of achievement the unattainables of the former.[14]

Believers looked to the hills of Colorado all around them and not only observed the majesty of God’s creation, but also the glory of Christ’s perfect fulfillment of the law and the grace he offered sinners through the cross. The church proclaimed its faith in the power of prayer by printing the charge of missionary Roy Smith:

With hundreds of thousands of youth in the armed services, with at least one empty chair in almost half our homes, with gold stars appearing on our service flags, and with Faith subject to attack from every angle, the prayer meeting is one service of the week absolutely indispensable in the life of any church that proposes to serve the deepest spiritual needs of the people. . . . In desperate days such as those through which we are passing, and those through which we may pass soon, the prayer meeting can become the anchor that holds the entire Church. Let pastor and people alike make it their business, and God will make it his business.”[15]

Rev. Suzuki would counsel and pray with many young men who wrestled with the decision to volunteer for the U.S. Army. Nisei recruits had to brave not only the terrors of war and racism within the ranks, but also the animosity of their Issei parents toward the government which was enlisting incarcerated citizens to fight. Suzuki also knew it would be the minister’s role to “weep with those who weep” (Romans 12:15b) when news came back of the many who were wounded or killed in battle.

Outside Support

Many Christians and churches outside of Amache showed their support and encouragement for the Nikkei. Twelve students from the Yale Divinity School offered to correspond as pen pals.[16] The AFSC sent a gift package of baby clothes to every expectant mother near her time of delivery.[17] In addition, according to its newsletter, the Granada Christian Church seemed to have more freedom than other centers for its ministers to travel to outside conventions and to preach at outside churches. Young people also received opportunities to attend summer camps and to interact with Caucasian fellowships. This may have been due in part to the influence of Director Lindley who had welcomed the residents with Christian love on their arrival:

I extend greetings and welcome to all residents of the Granada relocation center. We wish to make this an outstanding project, a good place to be, a good place to live, and a place that we can look back upon with pleasant memories. The past has been a period of adjustment, many things have not been as they should; the present finds us still short of proper living conditions; but we are working many hours every day to speed up improvements. . . . What the future holds rests with you and with us. Let us work together to meet our common problems.[18]

Many outside churches, especially the Dutch Reformed Church, were eager to demonstrate compassion for the internees and generously provided gifts at Christmastime. The Church of the Brethren also publicized the invitation to participate in this charitable act:

The door is at last open for Christian Churches of America to give gifts to those who are interned in Japanese Relocation Centers. This comes as welcomed news to those who have been inquiring how they might express concern and goodwill to Japanese citizens held in detention camps. The privilege of sending gifts has been granted to various churches and certain camps have been designated to certain churches.[19]

Christians around the country banded together to help internees celebrate the holidays. During the Christmas of 1943,

churches from all over Kansas, Iowa, Nebraska, Colorado, and many other states sent in Christmas gifts for all the children in the center. . . . Every block had a Christmas party and every child was given a gift from somewhere, from somebody. It was heart-warming that in spite of the headlines of hate, the good will of Christian America was still an overwhelming experience.[20]

The church at Granada sang carols together that first Christmas and also celebrated a candlelight watchnight service on New Year’s Eve. Despite the turmoil of Pearl Harbor, evacuation, and relocation, they were resolved to honor Christ: “This year we do not need to feel any hesitation in celebrating or worshipping the Christ Child. He has the only Way for the world, he is the only Way that leads us to God the Father [John 14:6]. So let us not forget Him this year.”[21]

The Granada Christian Church meditated on the life-giving nourishment of God’s Word, trusting that they would be blessed whose “delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers” (Psalm 1:2-3). The church bore fruit even in this season of dryness and remained ever green despite the heat of life’s circumstances. Many sermons, church bulletins, and newsletter articles reinforced their commitment to biblical truth. For example, the January 1943 edition of the Granada Christian Church News declared Philippians 3:13-14 as the Scripture for the year: “This one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” The church resolved to look forward to the new year with “hope and faith” instead of looking back with “sorrow and disgust.”[22]

The church held a Week of Dedication from March 24-28, 1943, with special music and guest preacher Kirby Page. Following this recommitment to faith, they increased their fervor for evangelism and baptizing converts. That year, they also hosted a Christian Youth Conference to call young Nisei into Christian service[23] and celebrated Easter together as well:

In the hushed stillness of the Easter morning, Amache Niseis, about 325 in number, gathered together at Amache Bowl to await—the breaking of a new day and new life. As the sun slowly put out its bright gleam across the horizon, three boys, with their brass instruments, resounded the air with gladness and joy of the Risen Christ. It was an impressive and a real blessing for all those who were able to attend the first Easter in Amache. . . . The Issei held their Sunrise Service on top of Amache Hill with an attendance of 190. Terry Hall was overly packed for Easter worship service—about 475 in attendance. Rev. Suzuki gave an inspiring Easter sermon.[24]

The church organized DVBS during the summers and also held annual summer conferences. The theme in 1943 was, “Facing the Future with Christ” and the conference hymn, Lead On, O King Eternal.[25]

Jesus Christ, the eternal King of kings, would lead his people into spiritual battle against their opposition. The church would conquer, however, not with weapons of fierce warfare, but with loving mercy. Then Christ himself would lead them without fear to the crown of glory awaiting them in heaven.

Rev. Jitsuo Morikawa preached the conference’s first message on gratitude: “One of the rarest flowers in the garden of life is the flower of gratitude. It is a beautiful virtue.” [27] His second message called for humble reverence before God:

We find God in the recorded pages of the Bible: In the manger of Bethlehem. . . . in Nazareth. . . . along the shores of Galilee. . . . on the cross, . . . [then] seated on the throne where kings and queens must bow at his feet. . . . The vision of God brings a sense of our unworthiness. The more Godly one becomes, the more conscious he becomes of his inner barrenness and less confident of himself.[28]

On the final day, Morikawa preached on, “What Must I Do to Inherit Eternal Life?” and “The Love of God” from John 3:16, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”[29] Only those who embraced this good news could truly be grateful for God’s goodness and worship him with humble reverence.

Leading up to the sunrise and Easter services in April 1944, the church reflected on their role in the crucifixion of Christ.

Even though Christ had been crucified at the hands of sinful men (Luke 24:7), the Father had ordained the death of his Son to pay the penalty for sinners past, present, and future (Acts 4:24-28). In this way, all mankind throughout history participated in the crucifixion of Christ. On Easter Sunday, the church then held a sunrise service at the Amache Bowl: “The service began late as it took a long time before the few piano movers got it onto the trunk. The High School Girls’ Glee Club sang two beautiful numbers and Reverend Terborg gave a great Message . . . entitled ‘He is Risen.’ An estimated crowd of 300 attended.”[31] Many were baptized on that historic occasion before “Rev. Lester E. Suzuki gave a short sermon on ‘The Transforming Power of Easter.’”[32]

Throughout the internment, the church took particular comfort in the words of Isaiah 43:2, “When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they will not overflow thee; when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee.”[33] This evoked memories of one stanza in How Firm a Foundation.

As God had been with Israel in the parting of the Red Sea (Exodus 14-15) and the crossing of the Jordan River (Joshua 3), so he remained with the church at Granada to make them more like Christ in the midst of their deepest distress. The Granada Relocation Center closed on October 15, 1945, yet according to Rev. Yasushi Wada, many believed in Christ during the center’s final months. This faithful church ushered countless children into the eternal kingdom of God.

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[1] James Lindley, “Granada Relocation Center Final Report” (15 November 1945), Special Collections: Schulz Center (University of California at Berkeley), 1-2.

[2] Suzuki, Ministry, 209. Suzuki recounted these details from his personal experience of living in the Granada Relocation Center.

[3] Lily Sasaki, cited in Deborah Gesensway and Mindy Roseman, Beyond Words: Images from America’s Concentration Camps (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1987), 45.

[4] Article II: Purpose, Constitution of the Granada Christian Church.

[5] Article III: Membership, Constitution of the Granada Christian Church.

[6] Rev. Chiaki Kuzuhara, for example, recalled being in charge of the religious education department in Amache for 300 English-speaking members (OMS Holiness Church of North America, “Chiaki Kuzuhara” [14 July 1991], accessed at http://kuzuharalibrary.com/testimonies/kuwahara.html). Unlike at Santa Anita, the Holiness group at Granada would join the Federated Christian Church in worship and fellowship.

[7] Rev. George Kiyabu was the only Seventh Day Adventist minister in any of the camps to serve within the ecumenical Federated Church. At Granada, he “held Adventist prayer meetings on Wednesday evenings, youth fellowship on Fridays, and Sabbath school and services on Saturdays in addition to preaching in the ecumenical church on Sundays” (Blankenship, Social Justice, 118).

[8] Amache Hi-Y, 1944-1945, BANC MSS 67/14c, Fld L4.09, accessed at http://www.oac.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/k6xg9z86. This organization was associated with the YMCA.

[9] Amache YWCA, BANC MSS 67/14c, Fld L5.41, accessed at http://www.oac.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/k6g44xd6.

[10] Granada Christian Church News 1.3 (13 December 1942).

[11] “Religious Library,” Granada Christian Church News 1.2 (22 November 1942).

[12] Lester Suzuki, sermon preached at Granada in the fall of 1942, cited in Suzuki, Ministry, 213-214.

[13] Granada Christian Church News 1.1 (1 November 1941).

[14] George Adam Smith, Today (June 1942), cited in “Message from the Hills,” Granada Christian Church News 1.1 (1 November 1941).

[15] Roy T. Smith, “One Indispensable Meeting,” in The Christian Advocate (17 December 1942), cited in Granada Christian Church News 1.6 (17 January 1943).

[16] “Pen Pals,” Granada Christian Church News 1.16 (9 May 1943).

[17] “More News of More People,” Granada Christian Church News 2.11 (26 March 1944).

[18] James G. Lindley, “To Residents: Lindley’s Letter,” Granada Pioneer 1.1 (28 October 1942).

[19] Anetta C. Mow, “Christmas Cheer to Manzanar Japanese Center,” Gospel Messenger (12 December 1942), 19.

[20] Suzuki, Ministry, 219.

[21] “First Xmas in Camp,” Granada Christian Church News 1.4 (20 December 1942).

[22] “Scripture for the Year,” Granada Christian Church News 1.5 (3 January 1943).

[23] “Review of the Amache Christian Youth Conference,” Granada Christian Church News 1.19 (13 June 1943). This conference took place June 4-6, 1943.

[24] Granada Christian Church News 1.16 (9 May 1943).

[25] “Summer Conference,” Granada Christian Church News 1.24 (15 August 1943).

[26] Henry T. Smart, Lead On, O King Eternal (1836).

[27] “Facing the Future with Christ,” Granada Christian Church News 1.25 (22 August 1943).

[28] Ibid.

[29] Ibid.

[30] Edgar Daniel Kramer, “Good Friday,” poem cited in Granada Christian Church News 2.12 (2 April 1944).

[31] Granada Christian Church News 2.14 (18 April 1944).

[32] Ibid.

[33] “Thought for the Day,” Granada Christian Church News 2.3 (16 January 1944).

[34] R. Keen, How Firm a Foundation, Ye Saints of the Lord (1787).