‘This is a trip of penance,’ says Pope Francis, ahead of mass to be held during five-day trip
Pope Francis landed in Canada on Sunday to kick off a five-day trip that will centre around his apology on behalf of the Roman Catholic Church for the abuse that Indigenous children endured at mostly church-run residential schools.
“This is a trip of penance. Let’s say that is its spirit,” the pope told reporters after his flight took off from Rome.
Continue reading...Church leaders express ‘profound remorse’ for suffering caused to indigenous children amid silence from the Vatican
High-ranking Catholic bishops in Canada have officially apologised for their role in the country’s notorious residential school system for the first time, after refusing to do so for years despite public pressure.
The organisation expressed “profound remorse” and apologised unequivocally along with all Catholic entities that were directly involved in the operation of the schools, according to a statement issued on Friday by the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops.
Continue reading...Recent discoveries of mass graves have shed new light on the country’s troubled colonial legacy
In May, Canadians were shocked at the discovery of the remains of 215 children at the site of a former school in British Columbia. The bodies belonged to Indigenous children, some believed to be as young as three years old, who went through Canada’s state-sponsored “residential school” system. The schools, scattered across the country, were aimed at eradicating the culture and languages of the country’s Indigenous populations.
The findings have brought the world’s renewed attention to this shameful chapter of Canadian history, left deep wounds in hundreds of communities and sparked fresh demands for justice aimed at the Canadian government and the churches that ran the schools for decades.
Continue reading...Walking Eagle News, which uses humour to skewer political hypocrisy, has built a growing following in the wake of recent horrific discoveries
Days after the statues of two British monarchs were toppled in the province of Manitoba amid growing fury over the legacy of Canada’s residential school system, where Indigenous children were forcibly sent for much of the 20th century, the website Walking Eagle News had its own take – not so much on the grief and outrage, but on the fixation with statues.
“Country was ‘mere seconds’ from reconciliation before the statue toppled: Manitoba premier,” ran the Walking Eagle News headline.
Continue reading...RCMP reveals it has spent 10 years conducting ‘large-scale investigation’ into allegations
A branch of Canada’s federal police force says it has spent the last decade conducting a “large-scale investigation” into allegations of sexual abuse at a former residential school.
On Tuesday, the Manitoba Royal Canadian Mounted Police said it launched a criminal investigation in 2011, investigating claims that students were assaulted during their time at the Fort Alexander residential school.
Continue reading...The recent discovery of unmarked graves at residential schools is the latest incident in decades of trauma for Indigenous Canadians, who are using lyricism to process it
After the recent discovery of hundreds of Indigenous children’s unmarked graves at former Canadian residential schools, Drezus – an rapper of Cree and Ojibwe heritage from the Muskowekwan First Nation in Saskatchewan province – grew unsure about his longstanding plans to release a new music video, Bless. He starts the song by calling the atrocities his people have faced “an act of war”, then follows that with bar after bar of Indigenous empowerment. Unsure if that would be appropriate while his people grieved, he turned to his mother, who had attended one of those schools. Her advice? “Release it, son. We need it now.”
This government-funded, Christian church-administered boarding school system was established in Canada in the late 1800s. Its founders’ intent: to forcibly remove Indigenous children from their “savage” parents and impose English and Christianity. Some 150,000 Indigenous children attended these schools before the last one closed in 1997. In 2015, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) report detailed nearly 38,000 sexual and physical abuse claims from former residential school students, along with 3,200 documented deaths. The mortality rate for those children was estimated to be up to five times higher than their white counterparts, due to factors including suicide, neglect and disease.
Continue reading...A First Nations community in western Canada has announced the discovery of at least 160 unmarked graves close to a former residential school – the latest in a series of grim announcements from across the country in recent weeks.
Members of the Penelakut Tribe in south-western British Columbia said in a statement late on Monday that the graves had been discovered near the site of the Kuper Island industrial school on Penelakut Island, nearly 90km north of the provincial capital Victoria.
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