Archival photos, Government of Canada
Oh Canada, what have we done? When we say in our anthem "our home and Native land" little do we note that this land WAS home to the Native or Indigenous people long before we arrived here.
And that, painting them with the image of the "other", "savage beasts" we along with the worst practices of our religious institutions, rendered them mute, beat them and savaged them sexually. We took away their songs and their language, their traditions. We took away their voices. We broke apart their families and then we buried their children in the walls of the prisons that we dared to call "schools."
Redemption, redemption and hope, deep healing, true reconciliation, weeping along with the families who suffer, this would only be a beginning.
On this "Canada Day" let us re-frame and re-think our country and its origins, let us bow before those whose land we stole, let us lie prostrate before them and ask forgiveness, and then over time, let us re-build a new image of this great country that is home for all. That is truly inclusive, and not a mirage of who we think we are.
All our illusions die this day.
This is a time of new beginnings, a new beginning that demands new leadership and a new vision for all people and for the Earth.
The old tattered ways no longer serve us, they are moribund. They are dead.
And that, painting them with the image of the "other", "savage beasts" we along with the worst practices of our religious institutions, rendered them mute, beat them and savaged them sexually. We took away their songs and their language, their traditions. We took away their voices. We broke apart their families and then we buried their children in the walls of the prisons that we dared to call "schools."
Redemption, redemption and hope, deep healing, true reconciliation, weeping along with the families who suffer, this would only be a beginning.
On this "Canada Day" let us re-frame and re-think our country and its origins, let us bow before those whose land we stole, let us lie prostrate before them and ask forgiveness, and then over time, let us re-build a new image of this great country that is home for all. That is truly inclusive, and not a mirage of who we think we are.
All our illusions die this day.
This is a time of new beginnings, a new beginning that demands new leadership and a new vision for all people and for the Earth.
The old tattered ways no longer serve us, they are moribund. They are dead.