‘A source of great enrichment for the Church’: Cathedral hosts first Mass with Indigenous language

Traditional drums and chants filled Holy Rosary Cathedral during a historic Mass that included segments in Halq’emeylem, the language of the Sts’ailes First Nation, some of whose members were in attendance. According to Archbishop J. Michael Miller, CSB, it marked the first time a language of a First Nation had been integrated into the celebration of the Eucharist at the cathedral.

Though the congregation at the May 28 Mass was not large, the atmosphere was warm on the occasion, a memorial Mass for St. Kateri Tekakwitha, who was known as the Lily of the Mohawks.

The Mass included several traditional songs as well as a Halq’emeylem translation of the Our Father. As with many recent translation efforts, the Our Father was the first prayer to be translated because it is well known. Deacon Jamie Meskas, who has lived among First Nations people near Agassiz for several years, believes this helped serve as a bridge between churchgoers and the language they are trying to reclaim as their own.

Because their language was forcibly withheld by the residential school system, many members of the Sts’ailes Nation are learning Halq’emeylem only as adults.

“The loss of language hurts them the most,” Deacon Meskas told The B.C. Catholic. He described the translation as a message not just to the Sts’ailes community, but to all Canadians, that their language “is okay, and it should have always been okay.”

Deacon Meskas expressed special gratitude for the service’s interpreters, Evangeline Point and Virginia Peters, who are at the forefront of an effort not just to maintain the Halq’emeylem language, but to promote it.

Point told The B.C. Catholic that the translation process has been very involved, with a lot of back-and-forth between translators and the archbishop’s office.

Significant progress has been made towards a full translation. It’s a boon to Sts’ailes churchgoers, and Point hopes “it will help collect people together.”

During his homily, Archbishop Miller promised the Mass was one of the “first steps” the Church is taking in its commitment to further promote the use of Aboriginal languages in liturgy.

“Liturgical diversity can be a source of great enrichment for the Church,” he said, explaining that there are already many different languages and rites being used by different Catholic communities in the Lower Mainland.

“They are all a valuable part of our own archdiocese,” he said, and their “different expressions exist without harming the unity of the Church.” He pointed, as an example of diversity, to the Byzantine Rite followed by the Ukrainian Catholic community. 

Archbishop Miller stressed that careful discernment is needed when approaching a new translation effort, and that translations take time.

Translations require serious education in theology, history, and culture – “of two cultures,” he said, referring to both the culture of the Church and the language and culture of the people doing the translating.

“They cannot be the result of an individual person’s desires, or even of a committee,” the archbishop declared. “They must always be in harmony with the liturgical life of the whole Church.”

He assured the congregation that, while this effort may sound challenging, it was worth it. A prayerful and thoughtful “process that rejects nothing that already exists in Indigenous culture,” he said, can help all of us find an “even deeper fulfillment in the light of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.”

Re-emphasizing the Church’s commitment to reconciliation, the archbishop read a section of the widely publicized address Pope Francis had given on April 1 to a visiting delegation of representatives of Indigenous Peoples in Canada.

“I feel shame – sorrow and shame – for the role that a number of Catholics, particularly those with educational responsibilities, have had in all these things that wounded you, in the abuses you suffered and in the lack of respect shown for your identity, your culture, and even your spiritual values.

“All these things are contrary to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

“For the deplorable conduct of these members of the Catholic Church, I ask for God’s forgiveness and I want to say to you with all my heart: I am very sorry. And I join my brothers, the Canadian bishops, in asking your pardon.”

Keeping a promise and preserving a language

Evangeline Point remembers the moment that she promised her grandmother, Nancy Phillips, to keep the Halq’emeylem language alive.

Point and her sisters had been taking shifts to take care of Phillips, who was dying of cancer. At one point, she recalls, her grandmother was being “particularly stubborn.”

When Point asked her what was wrong, Phillips said she was afraid to move on because she didn’t know what would happen to their language after she died.

Point was lying next to her on the bed. She remembers looking into her grandmother’s eyes and promising that she would do whatever she could to keep the language alive.

Immediately, she got up and went out to the back porch to think. The promise had just sort of slipped out, and she began to realize the implications of what she had said.

When she looked up, a coyote was staring at her from the bushes. For Sts’ailes people, the coyote symbolizes death and is believed to help people pass over into the next life. She remembered it looking her in the eyes before turning to walk away.

A short time later, her grandmother died, and Point resolved to keep her promise. That was in 1994.

She spent the next years studying the language at the fledgling Halq’emeylem program at the University of the Fraser Valley. Having concluded that she needed to learn more than to simply speak the language, she took linguistic courses as well.

It was a lot of work. To this day, she still studies with Elizabeth Phillips, an elder in the community and the last living fluent Halq’emeylem speaker, to learn as much as she can.

“She helps me with the small things, the details,” Point said.

Now, thanks to Point’s help, the Sts’ailes Community School has a full curriculum in Halq’emeylem from kindergarten to Grade 12. She herself teaches kindergarten to Grade 4 and keeps a picture of her grandmother in her classroom to help her persevere.

“When things get hard, I look at my grandmother,” she said.