"Let us walk together, arrivederci in Canada." Pope's historic apology to indigenous Canadians."Christ is indigenous": memory and reconciliation on Pope's trip to CanadaCanada: Going to the peripheries. To the North Pole and the secularist desertFrancis came to Canada to listen, as far as possible, to the 1.7 million indigenous people divided into First Nations, Métis and Inuit (the latter numbering less than 50,000). Many of them have suffered many, many abuses, mainly due to misguided education policies, and they are still very hurt. He came to ask their forgiveness.
In Iqaluit
Mission accomplished. It seems to be leaving many Canadians happy. At his last stop, Iqaluit, he met with about a thousand Inuit, a crowd for this territory of Nunavut, and spent more time than expected listening privately to a hundred of them who had suffered under colonialism. This capital of Nunavut has only eight thousand inhabitants.
In his speech, he especially addressed the young Inuit, who have one of the highest suicide rates in the world. With clear concepts and beautiful comparisons, he encouraged the young Inuk to pull up, not to be discouraged, to ask for advice from the elders, to persevere and to want to change the world. He gave them three pieces of advice: to walk upwards, to go towards the light, and to become a team.
He explained what the freedomIf we want to be better, we must learn to distinguish light from darkness... You can begin by asking yourself: what is it that seems to me luminous and seductive, but then leaves me with a great emptiness inside? This is darkness! On the other hand, what is it that does me good and leaves me peace in my heart, even though it has previously asked me to leave certain comforts and to dominate certain instincts? This is the light! And I keep asking myself, what is the force that allows us to separate within us the light from the darkness, that makes us say 'no' to the temptations of evil and 'yes' to the occasions of good? It is freedom. Freedom that is not doing everything that I like; it is not what I can do in spite of others, but for others; it is responsibility. Freedom is the greatest gift our heavenly Father has given us along with life."
Remembering John Paul II
Twenty years after the World Youth Day in Toronto, he repeated to them a phrase that St. John Paul II said then to 800,000 people: "Perhaps there is no denser darkness than that which enters the souls of young people when false prophets extinguish in them the light of faith, hope and love."
Today's speech was to far fewer people than that homily in 2002. What does it matter? It is the periphery. This will rebalance a Church on the way out, a Church that wants to meet every soul wherever it is.
The speech was in Spanish, translated in sections by the priest who has been interpreting throughout the trip (the French-Canadian polyglot Marcel Caron), and then a second time into Inuktituk by a local interpreter.
This is how it ended: "Friends, walk upwards, go every day towards the light, team up. And do all this in your culture, in the beautiful Inuktitut language. I wish you, listening to the elders and drawing on the richness of your traditions and your freedom, to embrace the Gospel guarded and handed down by your ancestors, and to find the Inuk face of Jesus Christ. I bless you from my heart and say to you: 'qujannamiik!' [thank you!]."
Built hope
The Canadian saint François de Laval (1623-1708) is comparable to the Peruvian saint Toribio de Mogrovejo (1538-1606). Both were tireless missionary bishops in a new world. On July 28 in the Quebec cathedral where he is buried, Pope Francis called his namesake, who was the first bishop in New France, a "builder of hope." The bishop of Rome tried to do that by visiting the world's second largest country. He built hope.
He had come here before and Jorge Bergoglio never wanted to be an "airport bishop". He never traveled to the United States until he went, already as pope, in 2015. But he had been to Quebec City as archbishop. He was invited by his friend, the city's then archbishop, Cardinal Marc Ouellet. Bergoglio gave a lecture in 2008 at the Eucharistic Congress of Quebec, which took place on the occasion of the city's fourth centenary.
Now he leaves tired but happy. He was sitting most of the time, due to his knee. But his personal sacrifice and suffering were as inspiring as that of his ailing and elderly predecessor, John Paul II, two decades ago.
Mission accomplished
He, the Canadian bishops and many observers would agree that this path of reconciliation between outraged indigenous people and the Church in Canada is still in its infancy, and that it will take a long time. But the reaction of the indigenous people who received him was very generous.
What can be assured is that once again, providentially, every cloud has a silver lining. In martial arts, it is common to use the opponent's movement to knock him down. Something like that just happened here. When it was thought that the Church would be knocked down, Bergoglio came and took advantage of the move to evangelize.
In this country, in recent years, the media and politicians have wanted to teach ethics to Christians, and lo and behold, the best known Christian on the planet comes to Canada and talks about religion and morals, with such humility, savoir faireThe Church wins with subtlety and sympathy. The journalists could not believe it, but the media could not make a vacuum for the Pope. They had no choice but to transmit the important events of the visit, and the gestures and messages of a great communicator. Because he came to visit the natives (who are "in fashion"), at their request. And because Francis is Francis. Even his very name is attractive to the men and women of today. And his person, and his perfectly calibrated message, too. He does everything he can to be on the same wavelength as those he visits.
The Pope knows how to sew. The needle of the indigenous boarding schools, a real tragedy (which still remains to be investigated academically, and this will take decades), allowed him to put the thread of Christ into the Canadian social fabric.
