A year after papal visit, apology, Canada’s bishops reflect on Indigenous outreach

A year after Pope Francis visited Canada to apologize for the Catholic Church’s mistreatment of the country’s Indigenous people, the Canadian bishops have shared their reflections on his visit and their efforts to serve and reconcile with Indigenous communities.

“During those days with Pope Francis in Canada, we recognized in him the Lord’s mercy, which he offered to us,” Bishop Raymond Poisson, president of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, said in a July 26 statement from the bishops conference.

“We realized that the Holy Father’s presence had involved great personal and physical effort on his part, but we also knew how much his encounters with Indigenous peoples represented, and still represent a living expression of a mutual effort – the Holy Father with the Church in Canada – to ‘walk together’ and to open up new horizons of hope within our communities,” Bishop Poisson said.

The bishops’ conference statement cited four separate pastoral letters on reconciliation with Indigenous Canadians. Three were addressed separately to each of Canada’s distinct Indigenous communities: the First Nations, the Inuit, and the Métis. A fourth letter was addressed to Catholics generally. These letters drew on listening sessions and other encounters with Indigenous Canadians.

The bishops’ conference cited Pope Francis’ remarks at Maskwacis, Alta, on July 26 of last year.

“I am here because the first step of my penitential pilgrimage among you is that of again asking forgiveness, of telling you once more that I am deeply sorry,” the Pontiff said.

“Sorry for the ways in which, regrettably, many Christians supported the colonizing mentality of the powers that oppressed the Indigenous peoples. I am sorry.

“I ask forgiveness, in particular, for the ways in which many members of the Church and of religious communities cooperated, not least through their indifference, in projects of cultural destruction and forced assimilation promoted by the governments of that time, which culminated in the system of residential schools,” he continued.

The Canadian bishops noted other recent developments, such as the Vatican’s affirmation of the rights of Indigenous people and explicit repudiation of the “Doctrine of Discovery,” a concept of secular law that drew from several 15th-century papal documents discussing lands discovered by European explorers.

The Archdiocese of Edmonton has produced a video about the papal visit, Papal Visit to Canada, One Year Later. According to the bishops’ conference, it portrays the papal visit as “a significant step on the road to healing and reconciliation” and tries to show that Pope Francis’ visit helped make reconciliation a reality.

It includes reflections from Cardinal Gérald Cyprien Lacroix of Quebec, Bishop Anthony Wieslaw Krotki of Churchill-Baie d’Hudson, Archbishop Richard Smith of Edmonton, and Victor Buffalo, former chief of the Samson Cree Nation.

In addition, Salt + Light Media has produced Walking Together, an original documentary about Canada’s residential schools, the ongoing process of reconciliation which led to Pope Francis’ apology in 2022, and the long road ahead for healing and reconciliation between the Catholic Church and the Indigenous Peoples of Canada.

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