Pope Francis has asked forgiveness for the treatment of Canada’s indigenous peoples, saying that he regretted that members of the Catholic Church had “cooperated” in a policy of “cultural destruction.”
“I am saddened and ask for forgiveness,” the Pope said to an audience of thousands of indigenous peoples in Maskwacis, Western Canada.
He spoke of a “devastating mistake” and acknowledged the Catholic Church’s responsibility in a system in which “children underwent physical, verbal, psychological and spiritual abuse.”
An estimated 150,000 indigenous children stayed, often forcibly, in Catholic boarding schools. These functioned as re-educational institutions, with the aim of assimilating the indigenous children to white, Christian values.
Indigenous children were not allowed to speak their mother tongues, were completely isolated from their families and culture, and were subjected to physical and sexual abuse.
