Will the Catholic Church soon issue a formal apology to residential school survivors? After declining an invitation to make such a gesture in 2018, Pope Francis announced his upcoming visit to Canada on Wednesday. There are therefore many hopes, the Vatican having indicated that this trip would be part of the process of reconciliation with indigenous peoples.
“I can’t tell you what his words will be [au Canada] ”, Said in an interview the president of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB), Mr.gr Raymond Poisson, who has been working for three years to make this reconciliation a reality. “But I trust him on that. “
The new Canadian Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations, Marc Miller, did not fail to recall Wednesday that “Indigenous people expect an apology to be presented on Canadian territory by the Holy Father himself.”
“Full recognition of the harm caused by the Native residential schools, managed by the Catholic Church, is a first step in the process of recognizing the harm done and a step towards reconciliation, which includes reparation. And I think that’s the next natural discussion to have, ”he added.
A delegation made up of around thirty representatives of the First Nations, Métis and Inuit will go to the Vatican from December 17 to 20 to lay the groundwork for this “pilgrimage of healing and reconciliation”. Five bishops, including Mgr Fish, will accompany them.
Pope Francis will possibly land on Canadian soil as early as 2022. “A papal visit usually takes six months to organize,” said the president of the CCCB, who formally invited the pope last September.
“We believe that the Holy Father will be for us, with the right words, the one who symbolically and with meaning will allow us to take one more step towards reconciliation”, underlined Mr.gr Poisson, who added that the Catholic Church wishes to act in “ leader ”in the issue of reconciliation with indigenous peoples.
Late apology
If the Catholic Church goes ahead with an official apology from Pope Francis, it will nevertheless be the last institution involved in the management of residential schools for Indigenous people to show an act of contrition. The Canadian government, the Anglican Church, the Presbyterian Church and the United Church have all already issued a formal apology.
The pressure has also increased recently on the Catholic Church, which at the time managed 70% of residential schools for Aboriginal people. In 2015, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada called for an official apology from the Holy Father, like the apology presented in 2010 by Benedict XVI to the Irish who were victims of sexual abuse committed by representatives of the Catholic Church. .
We believe that the Holy Father will be for us, with the right words, the one who symbolically and with meaning will allow us to take one more step towards reconciliation.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau himself brought this request to the Vatican in 2017, during a visit to Pope Francis. The following year, then CCCB President Mr.gr Lionel Gendron, however, had let it be known that the Pope “did not [pouvait] not respond personally ”to this request.
Last summer, when hundreds of unburied graves were found near former residential schools, all eyes were once again on the Catholic Church. In the process, the Catholic bishops of Canada apologized to the Indigenous peoples.
“We do not have a centralized structure in the Catholic Church. The dioceses and the congregations are autonomous ”, says Mgr Poisson to explain this late apology. Some bishops had also, on their own, expressed their deep regrets in the 1990s, he recalls.
During all these years, the Assembly of First Nations (AFN) has repeatedly recalled that a formal mea culpa from the highest representative of the Catholic Church was essential to move forward with reconciliation. Its boss, RoseAnne Archibald, repeated it once again on Wednesday.
“I continue to call for the Catholic Church to be held accountable for its role in the forced assimilation and genocide of our children, families and nations,” she wrote on Twitter. People must be criminally charged. And compensation must be offered to First Nations. “
Approximately 150,000 Amerindian, Métis and Inuit children were forcibly placed in residential schools from 1883 to the late 1990s. In addition to being uprooted from their culture and torn from their families, several residents suffered physical abuse. and sexual.
I continue to call for the Catholic Church to be held accountable for its role in the forced assimilation and genocide of our children
Non-Indigenous victims
While a formal apology is indeed offered in Canada by Pope Francis, it is unlikely to extend to all victims of sexual and physical abuse committed within the Catholic Church.
“When it comes to a sexual abuse committed by a priest in ministry, it is an abuse committed by a person and not by an institution, nuance Mgr Fish. [Dans le cas des pensionnats pour Autochtones], it is the institution which was linked to the Canadian government in this colonial adventure. “
But hasn’t the Catholic Church camouflaged the actions of the abusive priests? “They are people in authority, like a bishop, who would have closed their eyes or would have moved [les prêtres abuseurs]. In the [pensionnats], the institution has signed contracts with the State. There is a fundamental difference ”, affirms the president of the CCCB, who nevertheless condemns the acts committed.
Pope Francis’ visit will be a highlight for the Catholic Church in Canada. Only Pope John Paul II has set foot on Canadian soil on three occasions, in 1984, 1987 and 2002.
With Marco Bélair-Cirino and Boris Proulx