The Archdiocese of Toronto will hold a special collection
next weekend, October 1/2, to support the Indigenous Healing &
Reconciliation Fund. Catholics throughout the Archdiocese of Toronto are
invited to participate in this collection. The collection is a national
grassroots effort to assist healing and reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples
of This Land. The fund was the result of a $30 million financial commitment
made by the Canadian Bishops in September 2021.
Funds will support culture and language revitalization,
education and community building, healing and reconciliation for communities
and families and dialogue involving Indigenous elders, spiritual leaders and
youth with a focus on Indigenous spirituality and culture. This is an
opportunity to follow the invitation of the Holy Father made earlier this year
for each one of us to become engaged in the healing and reconciliation journey.
For more information or to donate online, visit: www.archtoronto.org/healingandreconciliation
That there is generational suffering amongst many of the indigenous peoples of Canada is undeniable. This has been a result of government policy, the tearing up of the same treaties, the perversion and corruption of chiefs and so much more. Is there clean water even yet in Attawapiskat? Over a century ago, the Government of Canada developed a policy of integration and assimilation. On one hand, there were good reasons for this, including full participation of native peoples in social and economic society. On the other, the national interest of resource development, railroads and Eastern European wheat farmers necessitating getting them off their historic land to make room. It is a complicated issue. I have written previously that, in my view, the great error of the Catholics of the day, mainly religious orders, was to work hand in hand with the government in an action against the interests of the people and of truth (as with the shut down of churches over the flu).
In two days, we will recall the Feast of the Canadian Martyrs who, while three centuries earlier, lived amongst the people and preached Christ and salvation. Those Orders and Bishops should have used St. Jean de Brebeuf and St. Isaac Jogues and companions as examples, not partnering with the secular state. Yes, we will go to their teepees and long houses and we will educate them and guide them, but we won't take them from their homes." This is what the response should have been. The question of residential school graveyards is an opportunity for anti-catholic hatred and bigotry. Yes, there are graves. Children died of diseases, influenza, diphtheria, meningitis, and measles. Maybe some were abused. A tragedy, but these are not mass graves as we understand them from Hitler or Pol Pot or Stalin.
To return to the statement above, Toronto Catholics and others in Canada are being asked to fund $30,000,000.00 in "dialogue involving Indigenous elders, spiritual leaders and youth with a focus on Indigenous spirituality and culture." What does this mean? A return to their pagan routes? The grandmothers of the four winds or whatever other pagan practices have been reborn amongst the current generation of indigenous witch doctors? They shut you out of the church and now expect you to pay for their errors while they affirm these people in pagan idolatry and deny Jesus Christ.
Not one penny.
.png)
.png)
