EDITORIAL: Pope Frances called his recent week-long visit to Canada as a “Pilgrimage of Penance” and sought forgiveness for the Roman Catholic Church’s role in running residential schools for indigenous children, forcibly separated from their families and subjected to physical, sexual and emotional abuse, causing hundreds of deaths.
Demands of an apology from the pontiff were growing since the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, established by the government, in its final report released last year described in great detail the cruelty and humiliation that went on in these schools. As part of the church’s ‘civilising mission’ children were also prohibited from speaking their native languages or practice their spirituality, which amounted to cultural genocide.
One of the survivors told a journalist covering the papal visit,” even before school, I was labelled as W2 783: W meaning western Arctic region number 2, the 783rd Eskimo registered from the region, and so they gave us little tags to wear around our necks, we were labelled like the dog tags.”
This happened not in some long gone era, though the roots go back a long time. It was in the 15th century that the Vatican had issued its ‘Doctrine of Discovery’ edict to lend legitimacy to European colonialists’ expansionist adventures. They grabbed native populations’ lands and other resources, mercilessly killing the natives in Canada, the USA, South America, Australia and New Zealand. In fact, a commonly used hate expression against ingenuous people in the US has been “the only good Indian is a dead Indian.
” Until recently, Hollywood Westerns have also been portraying them as savages. The indigenous people now want the Pope to atone for those sins and do more than saying sorry. They are seeking amends for the past wrongs, including reparations and accountability for those who oppressed children in the church-run residential schools.
No less important is their demand that the Vatican review its history and rescind its original transgression: the Doctrine of Discovery decree. Although the Pope stopped short of rescinding the doctrine, he did flay it saying “this doctrine of colonisation is bad, it is unfair. ... Even today it is used, often,” adding that “we need to go back and rectify the mistakes, while being aware that even today we have similar forms of colonialism, it’s a universal theme.” Meanwhile, the Vatican has said the matter is now under discussion, which means it is willing to make that amend.
All this is the result of the Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s initiative to rebuild relations with indigenous people, based on respect and partnership through regular dialogue for reconciliation. The other colonising nations, however, continue to maintain exclusivity.
No surprise then that in the US, Australia and New Zealand socio-economic indicators for ingenious people are far worse than any other section of their populations – with the exception, of course, in the case of the US, of its Afro-American citizens. The native peoples in all these countries expect and deserve better participation in the affairs of their respective homelands.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2022
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