Native America Calling: Vatican rejects Doctrine of Discovery

 

The Vatican’s recent repudiation of the Doctrine of Discovery has been described as a “major step” by some Indigenous leaders, but for others, the Holy See has a long way to go before it can heal the centuries of pain caused by the doctrine’s colonization and control. Today on Native America Calling, we speak with Steve Newcomb (Shawnee and Lenape), author of Pagans in the Promised Land: Decoding the Doctrine of Christian Discovery and cofounder and director of the Indigenous Law Institute, and Bruce McIvor (Métis), lawyer and partner at First Peoples Law.

Do the children in unmarked graves know you are sorry?

 

Papal Visit: Apology at last in Canada

By Miles Morrisseau
MASKWACIS, Alberta, Canada – Saying it is time to find a pathway forward for healing, Pope Francis issued a long-awaited apology to the Indigenous people of Canada for the Catholic Church’s role in the brutal residential school system that separated children from their families, culture and language. ... continue reading

...But it also brought tears – tears for the children who never came home, whose remains were dumped in unmarked graves.

Do those children who died hear your apology? Who will pay for their murders? We don't want an apology, do we? How about arrests?... TLH, blog editor

We Don’t Want an Apology: We Want Justice

 

Wednesday, April 6, 2022

By Doug George-Kanentiio (Akwesasne Mohawk)

There is a reason why the Six Nations-Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) were not invited to Rome to meet the pope and secure an apology for the victims of the residential schools — we don’t want an apology, we want justice.

Tens of thousands of Native children suffered abuse by the residential schools administered by the Roman Catholic Church with the compliance of the provincial and federal governments and it may well be proven thousands died either by murder or neglect by the priests. nuns and staff at the schools.

I was baptized into the Church as a child at the Akwesasne Mohawk Territory. I was taken against my will to the Mohawk Institute in Brantford, Ontarior, 600 kilometers (373 miles) from my home and, along with the two dozen other Akwesasronon (people from Akwesasne) endured sexual, mental and physical abuse while being denied adequate food and health care, our bodies marked by open sores and rotting teeth leaving permanent scars.

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