Cassidy Caron (pictured) says residential school survivors told her that an apology from the Queen would be important since she is the leader of the Anglican Church and Canada's head of state. They also suggested the Queen should pay reparations to survivors.

The school system was created to isolate indigenous children from the influence of their own native culture and religion, to assimilate them into the dominant Canadian culture.

Caron's call comes a month after Pope Francis apologised at the Vatican to survivors and indigenous delegates for the Catholic Church's role in residential schools.

"There's so much healing that is needed," Caron said.

"We need basic human necessities in our communities and it stems from colonisation. It stems from assimilation - and some financial reparations are absolutely helpful in helping us move forward."

Caron says she will make the request to Prince Charles and his wife, Camilla, at a reception with them at Rideau Hall on Wednesday.

The Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall are to visit Canada this week for a three-day tour that is to focus partly on indigenous reconciliation.

Mary Simon, Canada's first indigenous Governor General, called the visit a chance to "showcase the evolution of our country, our diverse and inclusive society, as well as the resilience of indigenous communities."

Many First Nations signed treaties with the Crown that made promises — such as pledges to share resources — that the Crown later violated.

"The Queen is also a treaty member and she has an obligation to live up to the agreement," said Paul Andrew, who survived the notorious residential school Grollier Hall in Inuvik, North West Territories.

"Through reconciliation, they can right the wrongs."

The Archbishop of Canterbury recently apologised in Canada for the Anglican Church's role in residential schools.

"I am sorry that the church belittled your spirituality, denigrated and undermined your culture and tradition, and above all your language," Justin Welby said in Saskatoon.

After witnessing the apology, Brian Hardlotte, grand chief of the Prince Albert Grand Council, said the Queen should complete the apology for the Anglican Church.

"That's something that I would personally, as a leader and a survivor, would like to see," he said.

Some 150,000 indigenous children were forced to attend residential schools - of which he Anglican Church ran about three dozen.

Sources

CBC News

Everything GP

The apology must be given to all survivors, and some would not feel comfortable attending a traditional Catholic event, the angry survivors say.

The comments from the current indigenous leaders represent a new generation that wants redress rather than reconciliation, says Fr Raymond de Souza in the National Post.

While former national chiefs Phil Fontaine and Willie Littlechild worked hard in the 1990s and 2000s to heal the relationship and establish new partnerships, the current national chief, RoseAnne Archibald, is twenty years younger and is less inclined, he says.

Archibald refused to join the delegation to meet Francis.

While the new leadership disagrees on some aspects surrounding a possible apology, they agree on four points.

• Any further apology must acknowledge the complicity of the entire Catholic Church and the Vatican, not just some individuals.
• Action must accompany any apology. This includes disclosing all documents on the schools and graves, as well as full payment of compensation which some estimate to be more than $60 million. It also includes repatriation of artefacts, repudiation of the colonial Doctrine of Discovery, and prosecution and extradition of abuser priests.
• All expenses — roughly $50 to $100 million for previous papal visits — should be paid entirely by the Vatican.
• The location, timing and all major decisions should be made by the survivors themselves.

The four points follow local reactions that poured in following Pope Francis' apology.

After watching Francis' apology, Osoyoos Indian Band Chief Clarence Louie said he was angry and disappointed.

"Come on let's get real, it was a forced apology.

"It was a political apology.

"When someone is forced to apologise, I don't think that is a sincere apology," said Louie.

Thousands of Indigenous children were forced into Canadian Government residential schools run by the United, Presbyterian, Anglican and Catholic churches.

Around 60% of the schools were Catholic-run.

"That church is a multi-billion-dollar organisation. It's rich, very rich and it caused the loss of our First Nations language, a lot of cultural damage, and it should be bucking up some of those billions to go towards the damages of the past," added Louie.

"There should be a criminal investigation done, criminal," he said.

"If just two non-native graves were found in this country, what would the RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) do? They'd launch a criminal investigation.

"Here you have 215 unmarked graves in Kamloops - where's the criminal investigation? There is still too much racism."

He added that Francis' apology came too late and now is the time for action.

"No more nice words; no more phoney, forced apologies. We need some anger and action.

"It is anger and action time in my opinion," said Louie.

The archbishop of Edmonton, Richard Smith, says the apology from Pope Francis for the role the Roman Catholic Church played in the residential school system is just the first step on the road to healing.

Smith says the pope also made it clear to the bishops that an apology needs to be followed up with concrete action, especially at the local level.

"Indigenous peoples across the country are distinct and they're autonomous. We've got to be really careful to avoid a perpetuation of colonial mentality, whereby we say to them: ‘Here are your problems — we know how to fix it and here's what we will do for you,"' Smith said.

"Those days are over."

At a press conference the day before Francis' apology at the Vatican, a series of Assembly of First Nations delegates spoke for an hour with nary a word about their actual conversation with the Holy Father; they merely read at length their prepared statements obviously aimed at a political base at home that had opposed the Vatican meeting altogether - so reports the National Post.

Sources

• CBC
• National Post
• Global News
• Global News

The Most Rev. Justin Welby, head of the Church of England and leader of the worldwide Anglican Communion, is visiting Canada from April 29 to May 3 to highlight the church's desire to pursue reconciliation with indigenous people. Besides the local stop, he will meet with Anglican indigenous leaders and other indigenous people in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan and Toronto.

Welby's visit on May 2 to the Woodland Cultural Centre, which is adjacent to the former Mohawk Institute residential school, will include a meeting with survivors. A prayer service with indigenous leaders will be held afterwards at the nearby Mohawk Chapel which was built in 1785 and is the first Protestant church in Upper Canada.

The Mohawk Institute is considered Canada's longest-running residential school, operating from 1828 to 1970. It was run by the Anglican Church that has apologised to indigenous communities for its role in the school system. Continue reading

This is National Chief, Gerald Antoine's description of Pope Francis' apology for the part the Catholic Church played in Canada's residential school system.

"That is the feeling that I have, because there is a possibility," he said moments after the apology.

"Today is a day that we've been waiting for and certainly one that will be uplifted in our history," said Antoine.

His comments came following a delegation of indigenous tribes - First Nations, Inuit and Métis - to the Vatican.

Another leader, Natan Obed, president of Inuit Tapiriit, said that people will have different perspectives of the apology, but "Today we have a piece of the puzzle.

"We have a heartfelt expression from the church that was delivered by Pope Francis in an empathetic and caring way.

"I was touched by the way in which he expressed his sorrow and also the way in which he condemned the actions of the Church in particular," Obed said.

Former national chief, Phil Fontaine, who first gave attention to the matter in 1990, says he hoped the long-sought apology would come.

However, Fontaine says he was shocked when he heard the Pope say: "I am very sorry."

Jubilation

The jubilation was felt early on by the wider group.

The indigenous delegation strongly felt the enormity of what they were up against going to Rome, writes Tanya Talaga, an Anishinaabe journalist for Canada's Globe and Mail.

"This has been a CCCB (Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops) controlled trip and, at times, it has felt like an organised pilgrimage, complete with Mass being offered every day at 6pm in the hotel basement.

"But this delegation is well aware of what it is up against.

"On Monday, the Métis delegation went rogue after their meeting with the Pontiff, the first of four private audiences.

"Instead of getting back on the idling church buses, they paraded through St Peter's Square, led by youth fiddlers.

"It was a sight to behold. Their red sashes swayed as they sashayed out of the Vatican.

"One elder even danced in her wheelchair," she wrote.

The apology

The apology came on Saturday (NZ time) after a week of talks with First Nations, Inuit and Métis delegations in Rome.

"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" said the pope.

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

"For the deplorable conduct of those 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.

"Clearly, the content of the faith cannot be transmitted in a way contrary to the faith itself: Jesus taught us to welcome, love, serve and not judge; it is a frightening thing when, precisely in the name of the faith, counter-witness is rendered to the Gospel."

Apology's context

An estimated 150,000 indigenous children were forced to attend Canadian Government-built residential schools to assimilate themselves into the Canadian society to deal with what was once called the "Indian problem".

The system forcibly separated children from their families for extended periods of time and forbade them to acknowledge their indigenous heritage and culture or to speak their own languages.

Former students tell of extensive and systemic abuse — physical and sexual — at the hands of authorities within the system. Indigenous leaders have termed the residential schools' system a "cultural genocide".

At least 4,100 deaths - due mainly to tuberculosis caused by deplorable living conditions - have been documented at the former residential schools where thousands of confirmed and unmarked graves have been found.

The State schools were run by the United, Presbyterian, Anglican and Catholic churches. More than 60 per cent of the schools were run by the Catholic Church.

The State and the other churches have already apologised, however former mayor of Kamloops and retired newspaper editor Mel Rothenburger says all aspects of Canadian society have a role to play in what happens next.

"Let's not forget residential schools were built by the Canadian government. The Catholic and Anglican churches were, in effect, the contractors who ran them. All aspects of Canadian society have a role to play in what happens now. That includes the media, which need to shed biases and assumptions and lead responsibly."

Francis to visit Canada

During the apology, Francis said he would like to visit Canada this year around the feast of St Anne, mother of Mary.

"This year, I would like to be with you on that day," Francis said.

"I won't come in the winter!" he joked, drawing laughs.

Canadian government

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the country's history "will forever be stained" by the legacy of the schools and that he was looking forward to the papal visit.

"Today's apology is a step forward in acknowledging the truth of our past.

"We cannot separate the legacy of the residential school system from the institutions that created, maintained, and operated it, including the Government of Canada and the Catholic Church," he said in a statement.

For Chief Gerald Antoine, a key remaining concern is a formal recognition by the Canadian government that the residential schools were part of a systemic attempt at "cultural genocide" or, as he explained it, an attempt "to kill the Indian in the child" and force them to assimilate.

Sources

• CBC
• National Post
• MountainView Today
• CFJC Today
• Globe and Mail
• CNS
• La Croix International
• The Vatican

"An apology is the beginning," said Cowessess First Nation Chief Cadmus Delorme. "An apology is required, and the rebuilding of a relationship would follow the apology."

The Saskatchewan First Nation made international headlines earlier this year with the discovery of potentially 751 unmarked graves near the former Catholic-run Marieval Indian Residential School.

Delorme said an apology would verify and validate the pain many survivors still live with today.

Read More

The alleged document details $25 million in "in-kind" services the Catholic Church provided as compensation for Residential school survivors — one of their obligations in the Residential School Settlement of 2006.

Court staff have confirmed the document's existence and have said that it doesn't appear to be sealed or under a publication ban.

However, the document has been in the custody of Justice Neil Gabrielson, the same judge who oversaw a 2015 case between Canada and the Catholic Church regarding the perceived existence of the Church's compensation to First Nations.

Read More

The Archdiocese of St. Boniface said Saturday that the three masses scheduled for Sunday at St. Emile Catholic Church have been cancelled on the recommendation of Winnipeg police.

During a July 10 mass, Father Rhéal Forest said residential school survivors lied about being sexually abused to receive more money during the settlement process with the federal government.

"If they wanted extra money, from the money that was given to them, they had to lie sometimes — lie that they were abused sexually and, scoop, another $50,000," Forest said.

Police alerted the church that they'd seen comments online and recommended cancelling services as a precaution, archdiocese communications coordinator Daniel Bahuaud said Saturday.

Forest acknowledged that a few had bad treatment. However, he said some of that was due not to nuns and priests but rather night watchmen.

The priest's remarks come as the discovery of unmarked gravesites near residential schools in British Columbia and Saskatchewan have roiled Canada. It renewed scrutiny on a system that sought to detach Indigenous children from their homes and cultures.

In its 2015 report, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission said there have been "over 40 successful convictions of former residential school staff members who sexually or physically abused students."

As of Jan. 31 of that year, 37,951 claims for injuries resulting from physical and sexual abuse at residential schools had been received.

Father Forest has also caused concern over comments he made suggesting he would shoot church vandals

Photos from July showed the words "Save our children" spray-painted on Precious Blood Roman Catholic Church in Winnipeg. It is an apparent reference to children forced to attend residential schools.

"As I'm passing by, thoughts of anger. If I had a shotgun at night and I'd see them, I'd go, 'Boom!' just to scare them and if they don't run away, I'll shoot them," Forest said in the July 18 sermon.

He then quickly backtracked, saying: "But this would not help, it's bad to do that, I'd go have a chat with them." He went on to blame the media for making the vandals believe the Catholic Church killed residential school children.

Sources

CBC

Washington Post

And there will be more.

Over the years, Indigenous leaders, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Canada's Parliament and plenty of Catholics have all called on Pope Francis to apologize for the Catholic Church's role in residential schools on Canadian soil.

Catholics operated up to 60% of the schools, where Indigenous children were separated from their families, abused and alienated from their histories and language in a process of cultural genocide.

Canada's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which centred on residential schools and finished in 2015, provides some clear guidelines and ample evidence as to what, exactly, an apology should look like, pointing to a 2010 apology made to victims of abuse in Ireland.

So why hasn't Pope Francis made the trip?

While demands from politicians or community leaders might create public pressure, only one body holds the keys to a papal visit: the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops.

It's easy to view the Catholic Church as a strict, obvious chain of command.

While the church is hardly a democracy, authority is distributed in complicated ways.

The pope is authoritative, but he respects the autonomy of local bishops. Without a collective invitation, the pope will not invite himself to a country out of respect for those bishops.

In other words, unless the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops requests the pope to come to Canada, no amount of political or moral pressure will get the pope on a plane.

And since the bishops have not been unanimous when it comes to wanting a papal apology in Canada, the conference has stalled the process. The Canadian bishops may not always say this publicly, but it's not a secret in the church.

While several bishops have said they want a papal apology in Canada, and some have even tried to make it happen independent of unity within the conference, other bishops often appeal to flimsy excuses to deflect the fact that they have not, as a conference, extended the invitation. For example, in a recent CBC interview with Rosemary Barton, the archbishop of Toronto, Cardinal Thomas Collins, cited two major difficulties: the pope's age, and the complexities involved in high profile papal journeys.

These may indeed be difficulties, but they aren't insurmountable.

In March, Francis went to Iraq in the middle of the pandemic. His potential trips in 2021 keep him close to home, but Francis has expressed a desire to visit the war-torn country of South Sudan.

Apart from Pope John Paul II, Francis is the most travelled pope in the history of the Catholic Church, and there is no indication that he has any intention of stopping.

As for complexities, Francis could limit such a trip to meeting with Indigenous people and residential school survivors, responding to the call to apologize in Canada, and moving on.

Of course, Francis could choose whether or not these are barriers himself — if he was given an invitation.

Collins added that grand gestures are not the most significant steps on the path to reconciliation, and he emphasized the quiet, day-to-day work on the ground. In covering reconciliation efforts as a Catholic journalist in Canada, everyone I have spoken with who does such work has said a papal apology in Canada would help their efforts. If the bishops want to empower local work, they should actively seek a more global apology.

In a particularly egregious deflection, certain bishops like to cite an apology made by Pope Benedict XVI to a delegation from the Assembly of First Nations in 2009.

Phil Fontaine, at the time the national chief of the AFN, said the meeting should "close the book" on the need for an apology.

After the findings of the TRC, however, Fontaine made it clear that things have changed, and he wants a papal apology in Canada.

Some bishops and the bishops' conference itself have nevertheless continued to quote Fontaine's 2009 remarks. In 2018, Fontaine said the bishops were misusing his words to resist calls for an apology in Canada. Continue reading

His story doesn't begin with a stranger in shadow-black darkening the door of his log cabin, but it is the first thing he mentions.

It was the day in 1955 the priest came with papers in hand and the determination to steal away Dave Rundle, 10, and his brother Lawrence, 5, from their parents and grandparents, to force them into Fort Alexander Residential School.

The priest knocked. Rundle (pictured) opened the door to the towering figure in his black cassock.

"And it wasn't Johnny Cash," says the now 75-year-old with a chuckle. He pardons the joke. "Humour sometimes helps."

Rundle's mother and the priest spoke some words incoherent to young ears, and after a time, his mother signed the papers and told the boys to get ready to leave. The priest put them into the back of a Ford Model T, where three other Indigenous boys waited.

As the car started off, clunking along the dirt path, Rundle and his brother turned back to look out the window. His mother and grandmother stood, watching them leave.

"They were crying," says Rundle. "My brother and I started crying because we saw our parents and we were going away. And the three other boys in the vehicle, they too started to cry."

For the next five years, Rundle and his brother would be separated from family, who moved to Winnipeg to find work, 10 months of the year. They would be robbed of familial love and caring. They would be degraded and hurt and denied their language and culture.

However, Rundle's story truly began in his first 10 years, at what is now called Sagkeeng First Nation, when he hauled water from the river for his mother, when his grandmother told him stories and taught him to be kind and honourable when his grandfather showed him how to set snares on rabbit tracks and said to him: "When you hunt deer, you need to know the habits of the animal you're hunting."

It was a story told in Anishinaabe.

"It was the best time of my life. I was so happy," says Rundle. "It was a good life. We weren't rich at all. We were piss poor, but we had lots to eat."

The priest that took him from this life drove him to Fort Alexander Residential School — a huge, three-story building, a church and a groundskeeper's cabin surrounded by Manitoba prairie. It was run by a Catholic order of missionary nuns called the Oblates of Mary Immaculate.

Oblate nuns, which included this order and others, ran most of the Roman Catholic residential schools in Canada.

"We walked upstairs and came into the reception area," says Rundle, "and that's where the nuns met us."

The nuns made the boys strip and bathe, and they cut their hair with scissors and mechanical clippers, speaking all the while in English, a language neither Rundle nor his brother understood.

When this was done, Rundle and his brother thought they could go. They put on their jackets and started walking home. When a group of boys ran after them, they fled, thinking they were in for a beating. But the boys caught up.

"There was such a sense of hopelessness, loneliness. Who could you tell that would do anything about it? There was no nurturing, There was no one to speak to if you were feeling down or something was bothering you. There was a sense of bitterness, anger, frustration."

"They didn't hurt us. They just said you can't go home. You got to stay here," says Rundle. "Of course, that made us cry again because we wanted to go home."

Rundle and his brother were captive.

"There was such a sense of hopelessness, loneliness. Who could you tell that would do anything about it?" says Rundle. "There was no nurturing, There was no one to speak to if you were feeling down or something was bothering you.

"There was a sense of bitterness, anger, frustration."

The boys had no supports but themselves when nuns humiliated a boy for peeing himself, even, as happened to Rundle, when they had asked to use the bathroom. They could not tell their parents when they were smacked across the head or the cheek or made to kneel in the corner on hard wooden floors for hours.

Rundle could not seek protection from a priest who told Rundle to pull down his pants, on the pretext of checking his cleanliness, before "he started to masturbate me."

After that assault, Rundle went and sat on a bench. His friends called him to play.

"One of my friends, I caught the look in his eye — as if he knew what the hell had happened," says Rundle.

The boys banded together. They bet their rations of lard and bread on foot races and other contests. Rundle remembers two boys, Elmer Courchene and Phil Fontaine, who took to carrying little Lawrence on their shoulders to keep watch over him.

On Oct. 30, 1990, Fontaine, then-head of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, denounced the physical, emotional and sexual abuse at Fort Alexander in an interview on national television. He called for an inquiry, which would not come until after the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada formed in 2008.

In the interview, Fontaine said: "Inevitably, if a group of us get together to talk about our experiences in residential school, in this case the one in Fort Alexander, we end up joking and laughing about what we experienced. And I think that's essentially a way of avoiding embarrassment and shame."

Humour sometimes helps.

Rundle didn't see any deaths but did hear rumours about them. Years later, at a gathering of survivors, a few women who'd been held in the girls' dorms had told him they suspected people had died.

What he did experience first-hand was the loss of family connection. Continue reading

• Image: Winnipeg Free Press

Where to get help

• If you've ever experienced sexual assault or abuse and need to talk to someone call the confidential crisis helpline Safe to Talk on: 0800 044 334 or text 4334. (available 24/7)
• Better Blokes which provides peer support throughout Auckland, including a specific Pacific group.
• Male Survivors Aotearoa offers a range of confidential support at centres across New Zealand - find your closest one here.
• Mosaic - Tiaki Tangata: 0800 94 22 94 (available 11am - 8pm)
• If you have been abused, remember it's not your fault.

Tensions boiled over after the discovery of hundreds of unmarked graves in residential schools. The graves are thought to belong to indigenous Canadians.

A statue of Queen Victoria was toppled during protests in Winnipeg, Manitoba on Thursday, before it was beheaded. The head was then thrown into the Assiniboine River.

Queen Elizabeth's statue was also toppled.

The vandalism at the churches included spattered paint over a statue of Jesus Christ, painted handprints on doors and text reading "Charge the priests" and "Our lives matter."

The protests come amid allegations about abuses in the country's residential school system, which saw at least 150,000 children forced into institutions under Queen Victoria's rule.

Britons have lashed out following the protest with many arguing the Queen is not "responsible" for the actions which happened "so long ago".

"There is no excuse for this sort of behaviour, and it doesn't set a good example."

Someone else said: "They are behaving like uncivilized barbaric animals!

"I am in shock...did not expect this kind of behaviour from Canadians.

On Twitter on Thursday, Alberta Premier Jason Kenney called the vandalism "appalling."

"This is where hatred based on collective guilt for historic injustices leads us. Let's seek unity, respect and reconciliation instead," he said.

Similar acts of vandalism have been documented elsewhere in Canada, including in Edmonton and Saskatoon.

‘I know that the Catholic church leadership is looking and very actively engaged in what next steps can be taken.'

Calgary police are investigating after at least 11 city Catholic churches were vandalised.

Indigenous groups say they have now identified more than 1,100 graves, mostly belonging to young people who attended residential schools.

Up to 6,000 are thought to have died in the schools, mainly in British Columbia and Saskatchewan. The schools were controlled mainly by the Catholic community.

The Catholic Church is yet to make a formal apology for the way indigenous children were treated. However, Pope Francis has scheduled to meet Indigenous survivors who attended the controversial schools at the end of the year.

In a statement on Tuesday, the Bishops of Canada said that a delegation of Indigenous People is scheduled to meet with the Holy Father from 17 to 20 December 2021, "to foster meaningful encounters of dialogue and healing."

Sources

• Metro
• Calgary Herald
• Vatican News

Gagnon, the president of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, and the archbishop of Winnipeg, delivered a homily on Sunday.

The sermon has triggered an intense backlash from many quarters.

In his address, he said that residential schools are "a big thing right now in Canada. I know that we Catholics, we're troubled, we're hurt by this a lot in our hearts."

He said that in his role he is getting "bombarded a lot," and that in dealing with the media, he's noticing "a lot of blame, a lot of accusations, a lot of exaggerations, a lot of false ideas."

"And so I say in my heart," he said. "You know something? There's a persecution happening here. There's a persecution happening here."

The archbishop's comments drew ire from Indigenous communities.

"It's very hard for me to articulate how outraged, disappointed, angry I am. To hear anybody in his position, given what's happened, talk about feeling that the church in any way is being persecuted," said Maurice Switzer, a citizen of the Mississaugas of Alderville First Nation. He serves on the Indigenous Reconciliation Advisory Group of the Ontario Human Rights Commission.

"To me, this just speaks to systemic racism at the highest levels of our society - that anybody, in the wake of what's being found out, would in any way suggest that they are a victim, given what's transpired."

Many in the Catholic community have also been dismayed. George Valin, a retired Ontario Superior Court judge, is one of them.

"Extremely disappointed. Sad. Offended. Embarrassed," he said, of his reaction to the archbishop's homily.

From the 1870s to 1996, more than 150,000 First Nations, Métis and Inuit children were forcibly removed from their families. They were placed in a system designed to strip them of their language and culture.

The National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation has documented 4,117 children's deaths at the schools. It estimates there were thousands more.

Recent announcements about radar detection of more than 1,000 unmarked graves at or near former residential school sites have triggered grief and outrage across the country.

The Catholic Church ran about 60 per cent of the schools.

Some bishops at the local level have apologized, as have the heads of some religious orders. Unlike the Anglican, United and Presbyterian churches, however, the Catholic Church's leader, the Pope, has still not issued a formal, public apology.

Pope Francis has agreed to meet in December with Indigenous survivors of Canada's notorious residential schools.

The Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops said Francis had invited the delegations to the Vatican and would meet separately with three groups — First Nations, Métis and Inuit.

The Canadian bishops said they hoped the meetings would "lead to a shared future of peace and harmony between Indigenous peoples and the Catholic Church in Canada."

Sources

The Globe and Mail

Indian Country Today

They are the latest in a string of recent events affecting the country's Indigenous communities.

The churches were destroyed as Canada confronts its history of systemic abuse of Indigenous communities.

Recent discoveries of hundreds of human remains at the sites of two former boarding schools inflamed tensions. The schools were operated by Catholic religious groups.

Police and firefighters responded early Saturday morning to a fire at the St. Ann's Catholic Church on Upper Similkameen Indian Band land.

Within the hour, someone called police to report that the Chopaka Catholic Church on Lower Similkameen Indian Band land was also burning, said Sgt. Jason Bayda of the Penticton South Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

Read More

In a statement Thursday, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB) said it has been preparing a delegation for the past two years, but plans for the trip were delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The group said it now plans to send the delegation before the end of the year.

"This pastoral visit will include the participation of a diverse group of Elders/Knowledge Keepers, residential school survivors and youth from across the country," the CCCB said.

Read More