Justin Trudeau can learn something from the church about apologies
National Post, 12 June 2021
Apologies are about those who were wronged, not about the offender putting on a performance.
Apologetics about apologies are understandably trying to some, but the truth requires it. Indeed, after more than a week of spouting false notions about the Catholic Church’s efforts to reconcile with Canada’s First Nations, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau might learn something from the very bishops he criticizes about how apologies are about those who were wronged, not about the offender putting on a performance.
Last week, I detailed some of the dozens of apologies for the Indian Residential School System that have been offered since 1991 by various Catholic entities. A timeline may help put everything into context.
From the early 1990s, those Catholic dioceses and religious orders directly involved in operating the government’s residential schools issued a series of apologies — some quite detailed and unsparing. This was a rather ad hoc process, though the Catholic bishops as a whole associated themselves with those statements in their submission to the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, which sat from 1991 to 1995.
In 2006, the pace accelerated with the signing of the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement (IRSSA). That agreement, which went into effect in 2007, called for apologies by the responsible parties. It was not meant to be a mere performative act, but the fruit of genuine listening and dialogue with the great number of Indigenous associations involved. While the Assembly of First Nations (AFN) is the most prominent, it was not the only one that was consulted.
In 2008, those consultations were completed and Prime Minister Stephen Harper delivered an apology in the House of Commons.
On the Catholic side, some expressed frustration that there exists no equivalent to the nationally organized Anglican or United churches. Catholic structure is very decentralized, with each diocese of religious order being independent of one another. So while there had been many apologies from the over 50 Catholic entities involved in the IRSSA, there was a desire for something more holistic.
In 2009, the Catholic process resulted — after similar consultation, listening and dialogue — with some 40 Indigenous associations, led by the AFN, being received by Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican. That took place 10 months after Harper’s apology.
In 2009, there was widespread consensus in Indigenous, Catholic and mainstream media reporting that this was a fitting counterpart to what the federal government and the other nationally organized churches had done.
The meeting was considered such an important part of the IRSSA process that the federal government paid the $100,000 cost of the Indigenous delegations’ travel.
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