A rare Shinto "porridge ritual" to predict the state of society and harvests for the year was held from the night of Jan. 14 to early next morning, coinciding with the traditional lunar calendar New ...

People have soaked in frigid water in Ishikawa Prefecture to pray for a healthy year and reconstruction of areas hit by last ...

“People have a feeling of being protected by this burial site,” says Morihide Naka, Shinto priest of the Konda Hachimangu shrine that conducts the rite, in which about 1,000 locals participate.

Dozens of people soaked and splashed themselves in painfully icy cold water in a pool at a Tokyo shrine, adhering to Japanese ...