With all due respect, it seems as if the Japanese are the masters of the artificial, creating fake stuff when the real isn’t available.

Dolls for the childless, or grandchildless

Fake Christian ministers for Western-style weddings

Only 1.4 percent of Japan’s 127 million people are Christians, but Christian-style ceremonies now account for three-quarters of Japanese weddings. To meet market demand, bridal companies in recent years have largely dispensed with the niceties of providing a pastor with a seminary education, keeping the requirements simple: a man from an English-speaking country who will show up on time, remember his lines, not mix up names and perform the ceremony in 20 minutes.

From a small beginning a few years ago, the Western wedding "priest" has suddenly become an established part of modern Japan’s cultural tableau. The lure of easy money has prompted hundreds of foreign men to respond to newspaper advertisements here, like the one that read: "North Americans, Europeans wanted to conduct wedding ceremonies."

"Now all the hotels have chapels with someone dressed up as a priest," said William Grimm, a Maryknoll priest who edits the Catholic Weekly of Japan.