Japanese young adults wearing rosaries as fashion statements

Published: 2004-07-12

TOKYO (CNS) -- Japanese young people, mostly men, are wearing rosary beads these days in a fashion trend that has nothing to do with religion. The fashion items are being snapped up by Japanese youths after popular entertainers were photographed wearing rosaries as necklaces, reported UCA News, an Asian church news agency based in Thailand. A large imported goods shop in Tokyo advertised "rosary necklaces" next to Omega watches and Meissen porcelain during a June promotion. Rosaries with a black cross and silver Christ were selling for $100. They were produced by Dolce & Gabbana, an Italian fashion house that first sold them as fashion items in Europe in the 1980s. "The necklaces sell well. Most buyers are men in their teens and 20s. When women buy the necklaces, they intend them to be presents for their boyfriends," a sales clerk at the shop told UCA News. The main difference between the rosary necklaces and ordinary rosaries is a clasp in the middle of the third decade.

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