The standpoint adopted here is that of a diocesan bishop serving in the Nippon SeiKoKai (NSKK, Anglican Church). The NSKK is a small church and has a long history in Japan. Its public stance has been relatively moderate and approaches Japanese society and other Christian churches in a modest way. Government agencies have tended to regard Christianity as peculiar and even dangerous. The moderate approach of the NSKK has meant that it has tended to yield its social work to the government. Liturgy and in particular the Eucharist has been the sustaining focus of the life of the NSKK. Monotheistic religions are regarded as not as suitable for peace as Buddhism and this creates special concerns for witness in a pseudo-religious and pseudo-communal society. The NSKK faces real challenges of enculturation and needs to find resources in the networks of the Anglican Communion for different experiences to be shared.

The contrast in social life between a messhi bōkō (sacrificing one's personal interest to the public good) and mekkō hōshi(sacrificing the public for the sake of the individual) cannot be settled in terms of a dualism. The Christian Church from its earliest times was without doubt a ‘public’ community. Setting up a hypothesis that the concept of ‘publicness’ presented by public philosophy is actually closely related to the ‘catholicity’ that has been a characteristic of Christianity since the time of the Early Church, the main object of this essay will be to demonstrate, by introducing concrete theological illustrations, that Anglicanism has the potential to be a ‘public philosophy’.