Editor:
Last week’s Papal visit to Canada has elicited mixed emotions and reactions in many Canadians. Here briefly are some:
It was praiseworthy of Pope Francis, a frail, mobility-challenged old man, to travel to Canada to apologize to the survivors of the notorious Indigenous Residential Schools System. The Pope stated that Christians must accept Indigenous Peoples as they are, including their culture, their language and their spirituality and, in effect, should not try to proselytize them. He was ashamed of the sexual, emotional and physical abuses that resulted in genocide against Indigenous Peoples.
Many felt the Pope’s apology was insufficient, and it also failed to state that compensation would be paid to Survivors by the Church. They also criticized his failure to rescind the 500-year-old Doctrine of Discovery. This Doctrine, at least in their minds, justified European monarchies to claim ownership of vacant or non-Christian lands and resources – that is lands inhabited by Indigenous Peoples in the Western Hemisphere, in the South Pacific and all around the world.
The Catholic Church was justifiably criticized. However, there were additional culprits in the Residential Schools System that included other churches and religious groups and the Canadian government. The foreign and Canadian governments that imposed their superiority complex and imperialistic colonial mindset on Indigenous peoples in Canada must also be called to account. This mindset led politicians and bureaucrats to adopt the Indian Act, policies of assimilation and cultural destruction to take the “Indian” out of the Indian, the Residential Schools System, the Sixties Scoop, the abusive child welfare system and other Indigenous damaging policies and actions.
George and Terry Goulet,
Sechelt
