Pain
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| The Kamloops Indian Residential School in 1937. Archdiocese of Vancouver |
“The pain that such news causes reminds us of our ongoing need to bring to light every tragic situation that occurred in residential schools run by the Church,” Archbishop J. Michael Miller of the Vancouver Archdiocese said in a statement. “The passage of time does not erase the suffering.” - NY Times
The Canadian Government's desire to assimilate indigenous populations may have initially aligned with a few good intentions, intentions that included helping people find advantage in a relentlessly changing and exploitative society. However well-intended past educational and social policies may have been, those policies too often completely robbed people of their language and culture, the very elements of identity that enable individuals and communities to retain resiliency, to adapt and to prosper.
The effects of the residential school system, the too often rotten fruit of government policies, amount to the abandonment and ruin of our fellow citizens, our brothers and sisters. The residential school tragedy should remind all that the state is incompetent when it comes to protecting spiritual and cultural matters.
And whenever one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or when one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it. - 1 Corinthians 12:26
Catholic Canadians have sat at both ends of the societal bench. At one end, missionaries foreign and domestic created bibles and educational materials in indigenous languages to help bridge cultures. Mass books were translated into a wide variety of first people's languages. Resources were developed by Catholics to support the retention of indigenous languages. At the other end of said teeter-totter, the Church cozied up to the devil. Whenever the Church rubs hips with the state, Catholics and others tend to suffer immense difficulties. (Are you happy with the way things have been handled with regards to access to Mass during the past year while pubs and liquor stores have remained open? Are you satisfied with coercive educational policies that, in their attempts to redefine human sexuality, differ little from past failed strategies?)
The Archbishop Emeritus of Philadelphia last week said that some Catholic bishops were “too compliant” with state and local restrictions on churches during the recent pandemic.
“If you don’t reach out to people who are lonely and suffering and dying in a time like the pandemic, then you’re not being the Church, and that’s very, very bad for everyone involved,” retired Archbishop Charles Chaput said last Friday on Fox News' streaming service, Fox Nation.
Many indigenous peoples are, or once were, Catholics.
Consult: https://indigenousfoundations.arts.ubc.ca/the_residential_school_system/
The indigenous peoples of British Columbia, of all of Canada, have had wounds ripped open this past week with the revelation of some 215 unmarked graves at a former residential school in Kamloops, BC. Archbishop Gagnon, former Bishop of Victoria and now President of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops is quoted in the National Catholic Register.
“On behalf of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB), I express our deepest sorrow for the heartrending loss of the children at the former Kamloops Indian Residential School on the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation,” Archbishop Richard Gagnon of Winnipeg, president of the bishops’ conference, stated on May 31.
“We lift up prayers to the Lord for the children who have lost their lives and pledge our close accompaniment of Indigenous families and communities,” he said.
Archbishop Gagnon said the recent discovery of the children’s remains at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada, was “shocking.” He pressed for further investigations into what happened to the children.
Consult: Secwepemc Cultural Education Society, Behind Closed Doors: Stories from the Kamloops Indian Residential School. Penticton: Secwepemc Cultural Education Society & Theytus, 2000.
His Excellency Joseph Nguyen, Bishop of Kamloops, has written a brief but moving letter.
The BC Catholic has this: https://bccatholic.ca/news/canada/archbishop-filled-with-deep-sadness-by-kamloops-residential-school-discovery
IMPORTANT UPDATE: see the update at the conclusion of this post.
Lest we are tempted to think that nothing has been done to address the wrongs of the past, a worthy read is offered by Father Raymond de Souza:
The residential school system in Canada was, with few exceptions, a loose network of prisons plagued by tuberculosis deaths. By cooperating with the state, Catholics became jailers working for largely indifferent warden.
There are so many better ways for people to come together, in faith and love and harmony than by herding people into industrialized educational institutions. A good start is for politicians representing citizens to sit down with citizens to listen to and act in harmony with the wisdom already present, for people to have an opportunity for a meeting of minds and to acknowledge creative ways to build educational systems that celebrate the best of each culture, the things held in common, and to remain aligned with the dignity of the human being created in the image and likeness of God. In brief, a good start is for politicians to be humble enough to admit they need the help of the people they are meant to serve.
Because our political leaders are not listening, our current system is, once again, failing to acknowledge true diversity by allowing a neo-colonial mindset - i.e., radical socialism, cultural Marxism - to pressure people into conformity. This new oppression has much in common with past evils: 1) it robs people of tradition, their spiritual, cultural and psychological identity; 2) it destroys people's imagination and inhibits culturally informed encounter; 3) it attempts to redefine human sexuality and identity; 4) it attempts to replace parents as first educators and to destroy family bonds by elevating the role of the state to that of parent. Catholic schools in Ontario, for example, are once again falling into a trap by thrilling to an embrace of the zeitgeist.
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| Excerpt from Letter of Thomas Cardinal Collins to Toronto Catholic District School Board 17NOV2020 |
"A more promising, brighter tomorrow."
Letters to the editor: 'The most tragic part' about residential schools - Cary Morin, Chilliwack, B.C. (National Post)
[...] As this new information (about the Kamloops Residential School) unravels in the mainstream of Canadian politics, those looking to point fingers at any particular person or organization, whether it be John A. Macdonald, Wilfrid Laurier, the Catholic Church — or any church — will be disappointed to discover that numerous people in and outside the residential school system, including politicians, priests, bureaucrats and others of all political colours, stripes and doctrines, worked in tandem to keep these abominations open for close to 100 years, even though it was likely some knew about the abuse and others chose not to know. That might be the most tragic part of this history. More people were involved than we would like to believe.
It’s an unfortunate image that we First Nations reap in Canada as second-class citizens. We hardly receive the dignity of our own individuality, expected to hone our stereotype either positively, frozen from pre-contact time, as a powwow dancer with special spiritual knowledge, or negatively as a victim of countless miscarriages of justice, ranging from those involving the land to those perpetrated upon our children.
I would hope that other Canadians learn from this that our people are trying to move in a forward direction. Besides being some of the friendliest people in Canada, we are also attempting to build better schools, provide more mobile health care, integrate technology (on which we are well behind our compatriots) and, in addition, build local economies, many times in the most remote and seemingly hopeless areas of Canada. We have a future here. Mourn our past, but also respect that we work every day to move towards a more promising, brighter tomorrow. My son depends on it. [...]
That many people - children, youth - managed to survive and thrive in the midst of the workings of misguided institutions is truly a miracle. Many others have only been thoroughly cursed by their encounter with the residential school system. Many people - for generations! - have suffered because of the psychological trauma entrenched in their souls and communities.
https://legacyofhope.ca/wherearethechildren/stories/
Pope Francis expresses sorrow for the news from Canada about the discovery of a mass grave at a former Residential School for indigenous children and urges political and religious authorities to collaborate in shedding light on the matter and commit to a path of reconciliation and healing. - https://www.vaticannews.va/en/pope/news/2021-06/pope-appeal-canada-residential-school-discovery-healing-reconcil.html
The walk toward healing begins with truth, the whole truth. The walk proceeds with people respecting each other and listening to each other. The walk is not measured in days or weeks or months or even years. The walk is measured by truth, understanding, contrition, love, mercy and forgiveness, in God's time, not ours. The walk helps us move beyond stereotypes, as Cary Morin wrote, to "work every day to move towards a more promising, brighter tomorrow."
Let us pray for the repose of the souls of all children, including the unborn. Let us pray for those who have suffered an unbearable loss in silence over the decades - siblings, parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles and cousins. And - let us never again cooperate with the state when the state attempts to coerce people into following some deadly ideology. Take note Ontario Catholic school boards! Let us never again cooperate with the state when the state attempts to coerce people into following some deadly ideology.
http://www.trc.ca/events-and-projects/missing-children-project.html
tsitsulh si’em’, s’aa’lh men.High Lord, our Father.
’uy’ kws ’uw’ mukw’s tthu mustimuhw statul’stuhw tthun’ sne.
Let all the people know thy name.
’uy’ kws nuwu si’em’s tthu s’aa’lh shqwaluwun ’i’ tthuw’ mukw’ stem.
Let you be the one who guides our thoughts in all things.
’uy’ kws xwte’ tst ’u tthun’ swe’ ’un’ shqwaluwun ’i ’u tun’a tumuhw
Let us be like your own mind here on earth
st’e ’u tthu lisas ni’ ’u kw’i tsitsulh.
like the angels in heaven.
tun’a kweyul ’i tthuw’ mukw’ skweyul,
Today and everyday,
m’istuhw tthu s’ulhtun tst tun’a lhnimulh.
give us our food.
’uy’ tthu nuwu kwun’s hay statul’stuhw tthu s’aa’lh squl,
Let you be the only one who knows our sins,
st’e ’u tthey’ tun’a lhnimulh.
the way we are.
’uy’ kwun’s shtatul’stuhw ttheli’
We want you to know those people
qeel’qul’ital’hw tthu s’aa’lh shqwaluwun.
who are tempting our minds.
’uy’ kwun’s kw’am’kw’um’stuhw tthu s’aa’lh shqwaluwun
Keep our minds strong
kws ’uwu tst tum’temut ’i’ qul’qul’ul.
so we never do evil.
stl’atl’um’ st’e.
Amen.
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