Syncretism permeates Japan’s religious landscape as many of the country’s inhabitants
at the same time. In Japanese culture, there are multiple ceremonial occasions and rites of passage that are commonly observed. For instance, during the three days after New Year, people in Japan customarily visit a Shinto or Buddhist shrine to pray for prosperity and good luck. Another prominent annual event is the celebration of the coming-of-age that commemorates young people’s steps into adulthood. In Japan, as in most other cultures, weddings and funerals constitute the largest and most important ceremonial events. Consequently, the ceremonial services industry’s main pillars consist of the bridal and wedding market, and the funeral market, both of which have grown into sizable industry segments. The rituals built around these events are highly commercialized. Many services offered by priests have standardized prices, as the services are treated as commodities.
Wedding ceremony industry
The
market for weddings and related businesses is one of the largest segments of the ceremonial services industry, surpassing the one trillion Japanese yen mark, despite the deep mark the COVID-19 pandemic has left on it. Traditionally, wedding ceremonies in Japan were held at home. After the Westernization Movement during the Meiji Era (1868-1912) and the influences of Christian-style weddings, citizens started to hold a wedding ceremony at a shrine and a reception at a hotel (both part of the same wedding). The industry flourished from the 1970s during the period of rapid economic growth in Japan. Weddings transformed into full-fledged one-day events, and wedding planners, as well as large wedding-specialized banquet halls, became a standard in the industry. However, expansion turned into stagnation and eventually contraction initiated by the economic downturn that followed the burst of the bubble in the late 1980s. The ongoing population decline in Japan also
led to fewer marriages and will continue to exacerbate the situation, which does not bode well for the industry. The advent of the COVID-19 pandemic has put an immense strain on the industry, as it not only reinforced the trend of decline in the number of registered marriages further but also led to smaller-sized weddings, which also meant smaller-priced wedding ceremonies.
Funeral service industry
The demographic aspects of Japan’s aging society offer a good environment for the
growth of the funeral service industry. In Japan, the vast majority of funerals follow Buddhist customs. Central rituals such as cremation and the collection of bones were introduced during the Kamakura Period (1185-1333). Since then, rituals evolved to become more flexible, eventually resulting in the commodification of religious services. In addition to traditional funerals which include a wake next to the religious ceremony effectuated by a priest, several new types of smaller-scale funerals are becoming more common. One-day funerals leave out the customary wake, while direct cremation ceremonies only offer the cremation service, without the wake or the usual religious ceremony. As a result, the
average spending per funeral has been decreasing. Similar to the wedding ceremony industry, the funeral service industry was also negatively affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, as bereaved families often opted for smaller funeral ceremonies to reduce the risk of infection.
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