The Founders' Meeting (Hokkinin-kai) of a Religious Corporation
The founders' meeting is the formal meeting with five resolutions between the preliminary consultation and the public notice. See what the minutes must contain and why the church is not yet a religious corporation.
Last updated: October 2026
The founders' meeting (hokkinin-kai, 発起人会) is the congregation's formal meeting, with its own minutes, that comes before the public notice (kokoku, 公告) on the road to becoming a religious corporation (shukyo hojin, 宗教法人). It settles five points: the rules, the name, the future officers, authority to apply for certification, and what happens to the place of worship.
This article is informational. How the meeting is run and the final wording of the minutes should be confirmed with a licensed administrative scrivener (gyosei shoshi, 行政書士), the professional who prepares the certification application. The software organizes the data and drafts the minutes from it, but it does not replace professional review.
Where the founders' meeting fits in the journey
The journey follows a fixed order: diagnosis, preliminary consultation (jizen kyogi, 事前協議), founders' meeting, public notice, certification application (ninsho shinsei, 認証申請), certificate (ninsho-sho, 認証書), establishment registration (setsuritsu toki, 設立登記), establishment notification (setsuritsu todoke, 設立届) and completion.
The founders' meeting takes place after the preliminary consultation period with the competent authority (shokatsucho, 所轄庁) and before the public notice, which must be made at least one month before the certification application. It is the meeting in which the congregation records, in minutes (gijiroku, 議事録), the decisions that support the application that follows.
The five resolutions the minutes must record
Official guidance (from the Agency for Cultural Affairs and from prefectures such as Aichi) describes the same set of five points:
- Approval of the draft rules: approval of the draft rules (kisoku-an, 規則案). See the required items of the rules.
- Decision on the name: the formal decision on the name of the religious corporation.
- Election of the representative officer and responsible officers: choosing who will hold the posts of representative officer (daihyo yakuin, 代表役員) and responsible officer (sekinin yakuin, 責任役員) once the religious corporation exists. The legal minimum is three people in total, one of them the representative officer; see how many responsible officers are needed.
- Authorization to handle the certification application: authorizing a specific person to handle the certification application with the competent authority. This is the resolution most often missing when the minutes are written as free text.
- Disposition of the place of worship and related property: the decision on what becomes of the property or place of worship.
If any one is missing, the minutes are incomplete for the purposes of the process. Check item by item before treating them as ready.
The church is not yet a religious corporation at this point
On the day of the founders' meeting, the church has no legal personality. Legally it is a religious organization (shukyo dantai, 宗教団体), and the religious corporation comes into existence only with the certification and the registration. For that reason correct minutes refer to the group as the founders' meeting of the religious organization, followed by the name of the church, and do not mention a board of responsible officers (sekinin yakuin-kai, 責任役員会), which is a body of a corporation already incorporated and does not yet exist. Those chosen under item 3 are people proposed to take office when the legal entity is born.
Who takes part: the founders
The founders (hokkinin, 発起人) are members of the congregation who take part and sign the minutes. The minutes record the total number of founders and how many were present, plus the signature or personal seal of the chair and of those present. Once drafted, a certified copy of the minutes, signed by the congregation's representative, is usually needed to form part of the certification application file.
What to prepare before the meeting
If your church is close to finishing the preliminary consultation, line up the five points in advance: a draft of the rules ready, the name settled, people proposed for the board, one clear person to carry the application to the competent authority, and the status of the place of worship resolved. Arriving with these decisions mature avoids rework on the minutes and delay before the public notice. What follows is covered in the public notice one month before the application, and the overall picture in the step-by-step guide.
How Church Manager JP helps
Church Manager JP is a tool, not a law office. In the formalization journey it gathers the five resolutions into fields, reads the officers already on file, points out what is missing and generates the minutes in Japanese, which go into the file on their own. It does not replace the scrivener's review, never files the certification application and does not represent the church before the competent authority. Those acts are reserved to licensed professionals, hired and paid directly by the church.
Frequently asked questions
Q. Does the founders' meeting take place before or after the preliminary consultation? A. After. The order is preliminary consultation, founders' meeting, public notice and certification application. The founders' meeting does not replace the preliminary consultation, which is the prior dialogue with the competent authority.
Q. Who are the founders? A. Members of the congregation who take part in the meeting as founders and sign the minutes. There is no special qualification beyond belonging to the faith community.
Q. Are the people chosen at the founders' meeting already responsible officers from that meeting? A. No. They are proposed to take office when the religious corporation is incorporated, after the certification and the registration. Before that the group is a religious organization without legal personality.
Q. What happens if the minutes leave out the authorization for the certification application? A. The application loses its formal basis, because this resolution (the fourth) is what gives someone authority to handle it with the competent authority. It is one of the easiest points to forget.
Q. Must the minutes be in Japanese? A. Yes. They are an official document for the process with the competent authority, and the Japanese original is what counts. A translated explanation helps the congregation understand the content but does not replace the original.
Official sources
Read next
The public notice is mandatory before the certification application of a religious corporation, at least one month ahead. See what it is, how to count the period and what to do if it falls short.
The rules are the founding document of a religious corporation, like articles of association. See what Article 12 requires, who decides the content and how it fits the certification application.
The law requires three responsible officers in total, one of them the representative officer, not four people. Learn the two roles, the legal minimum and how to prepare your church's board.