Toru Matsumoto was the author of multiple books, including the notable 1946 memoir A Brother is a Stranger. Following his return to Japan, he became celebrated as a popular media star and teacher of English.

Matsumoto was a pastor of the Reformed Church in America (RCA) and a missionary sent from there to Japan. For him, Christianity should be “something that spans all areas of human life,” but “it is a shame that when Japanese Christians gather in big halls around town, all they do is pray,” and that “the message of Christianity does not serve the individual economic interests that capitalism is supposed to serve, but serves to regulate capitalism. The Christian message serves as a regulator of capitalism, not as a purported provider of personal economic gain. The author describes Matsumoto as “close to Christian socialism,” “where the Word of God must be applied to every aspect of individual and social life. It could be said that working as a Christian missionary was inseparable from the development of democratic human beings.

Matsumoto was accepted in a sense in the American society where he lived for more than ten years, but only as a “Japanese”. However, when he returned to Japan, he was now considered an “American.

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