Pope Francis Apologizes for ‘Evil’ Committed Against Indigenous Peoples in Canada

Pope Francis apologized to Indigenous peoples on Monday and asked for forgiveness for the “evil committed by so many Christians” against them in Canada’s brutal residential school system. 

“I am sorry,” the pope said, while addressing Indigenous elders and residential school survivors at a former residential school site in Maskwacis, Alberta, about 100 kilometres south of Edmonton. 

“I humbly beg forgiveness for the evil committed by so many Christians against the Indigenous peoples,” he said in Spanish, his mother tongue. The apology was translated into English and multiple Indigenous languages.

Last year, Canada’s brutal residential school history was thrust into international news after Tk’emlúps te Secwepemc First Nation announced it had detected more than 200 unmarked graves of Indigenous children at a former residential school site. The news inspired other Indigenous Nations across Canada to scan other sites, with more than 1,000 confirmed in 2021 alone. Thousands more are expected.  

The government and churches ran residential “schools” across Canada to forcibly assimilate 150,000 First Nations, Inuit, and Métis children from the late 1800s until the mid-1990s. 

Children were physically and sexually abused, and brutally punished for expressing their Indigenous identities, including speaking in their mother tongues. More than half of the schools were run by the Catholic Church. 

“The memory of those children is indeed painful; it urges us to work to ensure that every child is treated with love, honour and respect,” the pope said Monday morning. 

“I ask forgiveness, in particular, for the ways in which many members of the Church and of religious communities cooperated, not least through their indifference, in projects of cultural destruction and forced assimilation promoted by the governments of that time, which culminated in the system of residential schools,” he said. 

The pope called the overall effects of residential school policies “catastrophic.” 

Indigenous leaders and Canadian politicians, including Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Gov. Gen. Mary Simon, attended the historic event, which was held at the former Ermineskin Indian Residential School site—once one of the largest residential schools in the country. Five teepees stood at the site for the pope’s visit: four for the nations of the land and a fifth representing the entrance to the former school. Sacred fires burned across the country in a symbol of solidarity, organizers told reporters. 

The pope also visited and prayed at a nearby graveyard where remains of residential school students are likely buried.

Chief Randy Ermineskin of the Ermineskin Cree Nation, one of the event’s hosts, told the Associated Press that he knows his late family members who were in the residential school system were watching the day’s events. Dressed in a Cree headdress adorned with feathers, Ermineskin waited for the pope to arrive at a nearby parking lot. 

"My late family members are not here with us anymore, my parents went to residential school, I went to residential school," Ermineskin said. "I know they're with me, they're listening, they're watching."

A nationwide truth and reconciliation commission that investigated Canada’s residential school system came out with 94 calls to action in 2015. One of the calls demands an apology from the pope to all survivors: “We call upon the Pope to issue an apology to Survivors, their families, and communities for the Roman Catholic Church’s role in the spiritual, cultural, emotional, physical, and sexual abuse of First Nations, Inuit, and Métis children in Catholic-run residential schools.”

The pope is on a cross-country tour in Canada, with stops in Edmonton, Quebec City, and Iqaluit. 

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