Our Lady of Akita

39°45′35″N 140°08′59″E / 39.7596°N 140.1497°E / 39.7596; 140.1497

Our Lady of Akita
A carved wood statue at Our Lady of Akita Shrine
Location	Yuzawadai, Soegawa, Akita City, Akita Prefecture, Japan
Date	1973–1979
Witness	Agnes Katsuko Sasagawa
Type	Marian apparition
Approval	April 22, 1984[1] Bishop John Shojiro Ito Diocese of Niigata
Shrine	Our Lady of Akita Shrine Redemptoris Mater at the convent of the Seitai Hoshikai Handmaids of the Holy Eucharist at Yuzawadai

Our Lady of Akita (Japanese: 秋田の聖母マリア) is a title of the Blessed Virgin Mary associated with the Marian apparitions reported in 1973 by Sister Agnes Katsuko Sasagawa in the remote area of Yuzawadai, an outskirt of Akita, Japan. The messages emphasize prayer (especially recitation of the Holy Rosary) and penance in combination with cryptic prophecies warning of sacerdotal persecution and heresy within the Catholic Church. A wooden statue representing the apparitions is venerated by the Japanese faithful and other Catholics. In December 1973, a Japanese television station videotaped tears coming from the statue's eyes.

The apparitions were unusual in that the weeping statue of the Virgin Mary was broadcast on Japanese national television, and gained further notice with the sudden healing of hearing impairments experienced by Sasagawa after the apparitions.^{[2][better source needed]} The image also became affiliated with The Lady of All Nations movement, with which the message shares some similarities.

The local ordinary of the convent, John Shojiro Ito, Bishop of Niigata (r. 1962–1985),^[3] recognized "the supernatural character of a series of mysterious events concerning the statue of the Holy Mother Mary" and authorized "the veneration of the Holy Mother of Akita" within the Roman Catholic Diocese of Niigata in a 1984 pastoral letter.