Right Relations ministries and the Bishop’s Collaborative for Right Relations have undertaken an audit of our diocese’s progress on our responsibilities to the 94 Calls to Action. This work is being carried by dedicated members of the Diocese of Toronto, including clergy, lay people and survivors of Residential Schools and intergenerational survivors. Of the 94 Calls to Action, 13 specifically name and call upon the Church. We encourage all parishes to study the Calls and use them as a framework for spiritual renewal, advocacy and discipleship.

The 94 Calls to Action are a pathway to healing and reconciliation that requires the participation of all of us and every sector of society. Chief Dr. Wilton Littlechild, commissioner of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, teaches that the Cree word for reconciliation is “wītaskīwin,” meaning restoring good relations through respect. Christian colonialism has been unmasked of its heresies by the testimonies of thousands of survivors whose bodies bear the scars of abuse by religious leaders. The journey of restoring good and right relations is a spiritual practice that requires courage, humility and commitment. Truth leads us to freedom and transformation. Jesus’ life, death and resurrection testifies to God’s boundless solidarity with the wounded and oppressed, while promising hope and new life. In this 10^th anniversary of the 94 Calls to Action, let us not despair or sink into apathy. Let our spiritual renewal in Christ energize us to participate in the work of new creation in our midst, where the Spirit is speaking to the Church and calling us to greater authenticity to the faith we hold. The 13 Calls to Action that name the Church call us to enact our values through solidarity and healing from false doctrines of Christian colonialism. They call upon the Church to transform our relationship with land, Indigenous nations, power and theologies of European supremacy.

Calls to Action #45 and #49 call for the repudiation of the Doctrine of Discovery and theologies that justify European sovereignty over Indigenous lands and peoples, and a renewal of the treaty relationship that is built on mutual respect. The Doctrine of Discovery gave religious and legal justification for the forced enslavement of non-Christian people and the theft of their lands. This dehumanizing doctrine is the bedrock of the Residential School system, where Indigenous children were subject to forced labour. Many survivors have likened their experience of exploitation to concentration camps. The treaty process contrasts this culture of violence against children and dehumanization, calling on all people on this land to live with respect and responsibility to all life. Call to Action #45 illustrates how renewing treaty relationships is a remedy to the destruction of the Doctrine of Discovery. To honour this Call, Right Relations ministries is studying our relationship with land, displacement of Indigenous peoples and land acquisition in this territory.

Responding to Call to Action #45 and #49 in your parish:

• Review your roots. How was your parish established? Review records and documentation relating to how your parish acquired land, local history of Indigenous displacement (by Indigenous sources), and local treaties. Share what you have learned or ask for support from Right Relations ministries by emailing lkern@toronto.anglican.ca.
• Learn about the Doctrine of Discovery. Though the Doctrine of Discovery was repudiated by General Synod 2010, it continues to be the foundation of Canadian society and the ongoing denial of Indigenous sovereignty. As a parish community, commit to watching the award-winning film by Anglican Video, “Stolen Lands, Strong Hearts” and utilizing its powerful study guide at www.anglican.ca/primate/tfc/drj/doctrineofdiscovery.

Responding to Calls to Action #71-76:

Calls to Action #71-76 speak to the painful reality of missing children and unmarked burials associated with Residential Schools. Sites of Truth, Sites of Conscience: Unmarked Burials and Mass Graves of Missing and Disappeared Indigenous Children in Canada states that:

“[In Residential Schools] Thousands of Indigenous children were subjected to violence, abuse, disease and neglect in these institutions, and many of them died. Their death rates were far higher than those of non-Indigenous school-aged children. When they died, government and Church officials often did not return the children to their families and communities for burial. They were buried instead in cemeteries at the institutions, often in unmarked and mass graves that were sometimes dug by other children. Many of these cemeteries and burial sites are neglected, abandoned and unprotected. Families were provided with little information about what happened to their children.”

The federal government has discontinued funding for the National Advisory Committee on Residential Schools Missing Children and Unmarked Burials. This funding is essential to continue the sacred work of honouring deceased Indigenous children and fulfilling Calls to Action #71-76. Here is what you can do:

• Engage with truth. Dignified burial and honour of the deceased is a Christian value. Read the Special Interlocutor on Missing Children and Unmarked Burial reports in a study group in your parish. Visit www.osi-bis.ca/osi-resources/reports.
• Advocate that the federal government restore funding for the Indigenous-led “identify, locate and commemorate” missing children program.
• Fundraise to support the Survivors’ Secretariat’s ongoing search of the grounds of the Mohawk Institute, an Anglican Residential School. Visit www.survivorssecretariat.ca.

How is your parish, family and community honouring our sacred obligations to the 94 Calls to Action, survivors and the children who never returned home from the Residential Schools? As we reflect on our journey of the past 10 years, let us all renew our commitments to truth and reconciliation.

“I urge all Canadians to not be bystanders. Each of us must stand up and speak out. We must insist that these missing children, who were abused and neglected during their lives, now be treated with the respect and human dignity they deserve. We need to work together as we move forward. Let us honour and support all the survivors, Indigenous families and communities leading this sacred work and keep the Spirits of the children foremost in our hearts and in our minds.” (Independent Special Interlocutor, “Sacred Responsibility: Searching for the Missing Children and Unmarked Burials,” Interim Report, 2023, page 4.)

Amen.

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Other dioceses have also committed to a 10 per cent tithe, while the Province of the Northern Lights (formerly the Province of Rupert’s Land) passed a motion in 2024 pledging 50 per cent of revenue from land sales to Indigenous communities. A spirit of repentance, renewal and return is indeed blowing across the land.

In his support of Motion 12, Bishop Asbil emphasized our need to examine the concept of property theologically and historically: how did the Diocese of Toronto acquire land?

In 1763, King George III’s royal proclamation asserted English dominion and sovereignty over the Great Lakes basin and much of Turtle Island (North America). Indigenous nations were under his “dominion” and only the Crown was to sell Indigenous lands. The Independent Special Interlocutor’s Executive Summary: Final Report on the Missing and Disappeared Indigenous Children and Unmarked Burials in Canada, states that:

“The majority of lands in Canada are owned and managed by government. The concept of ‘Crown land’ comes from 11^th century British law that asserts that only the Crown could properly own lands. [In Canada,] less than 11 per cent of land is in private hands, 41 per cent is federal Crown land, and another 48 per cent is provincial Crown land. These Crown lands generate government income through surface and subsurface rights to the mineral, energy, forest and water resources leased to private enterprises… [Crown lands as a concept] upholds the Doctrine of Discovery, and currently there is no Canadian legal pathway to resume full jurisdiction and governance authority over Indigenous lands.”

Under this framework, Indigenous nations were divided and confined to small reserve lands, which are ultimately controlled by the Crown. The Crown justified ongoing colonization and land theft on Turtle Island through an emphasis on Christianization. This was expressed in the 1791 Constitutional Act, which privileged the Church of England over other denominations and granted it one-seventh of all Crown lands, known as the Clergy Reserves. The Clergy Reserves were used to build parishes and rectories, while others were leased and sold to settlers, with profits held by the Church of England in Upper Canada. Settlers were encouraged to clear-cut the lands, once teeming with biodiversity. Profits from the sale of Clergy Reserves continue to generate profits that fund parishes in the Diocese of Toronto. The Clergy Reserve system demonstrates the economic privilege of the Diocese of Toronto built on the displacement of Indigenous nations.

Indigenous nations, including the Anishinabek nations that signed treaties with settlers (the Williams treaties and the treaties of Toronto), did not consider this a land “surrender” but a sacred commitment to sharing and hospitality. This came up against English ideas of private property and racism. For example, in 1796 a group of soldiers of the Queen’s York Rangers attempted to rape family members of Chief Wabakinine who were camped near St. Lawrence Market, where they sold salmon. Chief Wabakinine was a signatory of the first of the Toronto treaties. The settlers beat Chief Wabakinine and his wife to death. Despite the lobbying and outrage of the Mississaugas and Anishinabek nations, settlers in power, who were overwhelmingly members of the Church of England, would not prosecute the offenders. As Reclaiming Power and Place, the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls and Two-Spirit People demonstrated in 2019, gender-based violence, denial of Indigenous sovereignty, the breaking of treaties and land dispossession continue to be interconnected forces.

As Indigenous peoples were violently displaced from their territories, the Anglican Church expanded and participated in the denial of Indigenous sovereignty and genocide of Indigenous nations. Our wealth and land holdings are rooted in a history and ongoing presence of occupation that seeks to place Indigenous sovereignty as a struggle somewhere far away – not under our very feet. Anglicans across the diocese are committed to meaningfully addressing this imbalance of power and wealth, taking steps to reckon with our historic privilege.

Repentance means a turning around or a change of direction: how can our examination of our past inform a new path forward? In this Season of Spiritual Renewal, what fruits worthy of repentance might be born from our recognition of our spiritual obligations and responsibilities on this land? As we examine our relationship to property and the future of the Reconciliation Land Tithe, the Anishinabek nation has called for Land Back; how might the Church respond?

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The memorial is a fulfillment of Toronto’s responsibility to Call to Action #82 of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, to create “publicly accessible, highly visible Residential Schools monuments in each capital city to honour survivors and all the children who were lost to their families and communities.” Ava Hill continued: “This Spirit Garden is in response to this call to action.” The crowd erupted in cheers. The Spirit Garden, and the stories and teachings it carries, will not be erased and will stand for generations to come.

All day the sound of children’s laughter intermingled with the testimonies of survivors, the heartbeat of drums, the smell of sacred medicines, and the vibrancy of ribbon skirts, shirts and ceremonial regalia. As I spoke with survivors, diocesan staff, clergy, bishops, friends and community members, what struck everyone was the joy of seeing so many children and young people present. Being surrounded by little ones from daycares and children visiting from nearby schools, their radiant joy and curiosity, their empathy and care, underlined the testimonies survivors shared at the opening of the Spirit Garden.

Survivors harrowingly spoke of being taken from their loving parents when they were so young that they did not know them until they reconnected 30 or 40 years later. A survivor named Clara spoke of meeting her siblings as adults. “They were like strangers to me,” she said. Taken from her mother in 1963, Clara said, “I never knew my mother until I met her in the early ‘90s.” Survivors echoed this heartbreaking reality of growing up in a cold and abusive institution, without the loving care of their parents, siblings and grandparents, graduating from Residential School and feeling completely alone in the world. Survivors remembered siblings who died at Residential School and the grief of their parents who were never given any information about what happened to their children.

Gord Peters placed the testimonies of survivors in historical context, reminding those present that 40 per cent of children who attended Residential Schools did not survive to graduate. He stated: “Canada calls this a dark chapter. It’s not a dark chapter: it’s Canadian history. Canadians have to accept and change that history. There’s a long road to recovery for our people but we are well on our way.”

That road of recovery and revitalization is memorialized in the monument as a turtle climbing over rocks and obstacles. Carved in stone below the turtle are the names of 18 federally funded Residential Schools that operated in Ontario. As the turtle climbs, it symbolizes cultural recovery over the horrific legacy of Residential Schools. The turtle symbolizes the first mother – mother earth – and symbolizes the rightful place of Indigenous people in creation. The courage of the turtle to continue to climb over obstacles symbolizes the strength and perseverance of survivors, who courageously shattered the silence of abuse and testified on the international stage at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

Michael Cheena, a survivor who travelled with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission for four years, and a proud member of St. John the Baptist, Norway in Toronto, said, “The Residential School system was a national crime, it was a national secret… I want to recognize the survivors, the courage of the survivors, who carried their childhood wounds into their adult lives and have lived to tell the truth of this day.” Survivors broke through the oppression of this “national secret.” Through the 94 Calls to Action, survivors have marked a pathway forward for justice and healing for all peoples on this land.

The Spirit Garden will be animated throughout the year, with its sacred teaching lodge full of the stories, languages, traditional teachings, histories and cultures that Residential Schools sought to silence. Elder the Rev. Canon Andrew Wesley shared that the teaching that will happen at the Spirit Garden will not only support Indigenous people in their cultural revitalization, but also educate all people about what happened in Residential Schools, that they might “understand and help be called into action.” The Diocese of Toronto invested in the Spirit Garden, in partnership with Toronto Council Fire, that we might fulfill our responsibilities to Indigenous peoples in Call to Action #82.

Survivors spoke throughout the opening of the Spirit Garden of how frustrating it is for them that so few of the Calls to Action have been fulfilled. This year, let us keep this summons at the centre of our hearts, let us spend time in prayer, memorial and dialogue at the Spirit Garden, as we seek to honour our responsibilities to all 94 Calls to Action. Concluding the opening ceremony of the Spirit Garden, Gord Peters closed with this blessing: “May your families be healthy and strong, and may we carry on our responsibilities.” Amen.

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In December 2021, Toronto’s Homeless Memorial added 35 names of people who died from causes related to houselessness in the city of Toronto. Every second Tuesday of the month, people gather outside the Church of the Holy Trinity in downtown Toronto, to name, to remember and to grieve the loved ones we have lost to tragic and preventable circumstances. Years ago, we would often have eight or nine names to add to the memorial monthly, but that number continues to rise, doubling, and now tripling. Every week I hear of the passing of several community members and friends, many of whom I have known for years.

Last winter we witnessed the city of Toronto evicting people living in encampments while there were no indoor shelter-hotel beds available: where were people supposed to go? In response, we organized with impacted families to advocate for an increase of 2,000 beds and private shelter rooms in the city of Toronto’s emergency housing programs, but we have seen no expansion. Within the underfunded and under-resourced shelter system we have heard shocking reports of residents experiencing rape, theft, transphobia, racism and even murder. 

Despite our advocacy efforts and raising these horrific findings with city officials, we have seen little movement or efforts to increase the wellbeing, safety and privacy of residents. The overwhelming majority of houseless people are Indigenous, many are Survivors or intergenerational Survivors of child confinement institutions, including Indian Residential Schools and Indian Hospitals. A just response to the crisis of a dramatic rise in deaths in city-run institutions would prioritize the experience and knowledge of residents.

Many of our community members are missing. We have filed missing persons reports but they have led nowhere. We have been told that there are hundreds of unidentified and unclaimed bodies in Toronto’s morgue. Every time I refer a community member into a shelter-hotel I wonder if I will see them again. Every month the shelter system releases anonymous numbers of the amount of people who died in its services recently; we honour them at the Homeless Memorial service as Jane, Jay or John Doe. However, we know that every one of them had a name and little is being done to honour them or connect with the deceased’s family and community. 

Last week I learned of the tragic passing of a vibrant soul and wonderful Anishnaabe artist whom I had known for years. He died while riding the subway late at night, he was found unresponsive, and the cause of death is unknown. I recently broke the news of his death to another community member who knew and loved him. He broke down in tears at the thought of his friend dying alone, riding the TTC to stay warm because of severe winter weather and a constantly full shelter system. 

As we grieved the constant confrontation of the decimation of our communities he reflected: “I can’t take this, it’s like everyone is dying. Over 300 people have died at the Bond [shelter-hotel] since it opened during the pandemic. A shelter isn’t supposed to have a graveyard. A shelter isn’t supposed to be haunted. My wife died there, and I have no choice but to stay in the same institution that led to her sudden death. When we enter the shelters, they don’t ask for a next of kin. So many people have died that they don’t even tell us when someone passes. How are we supposed to grieve them if we don’t know they died? They aren’t contacting families or reaching out for people to be identified. If I die in the shelter or in a tent, who will tell my daughter?” 

Our community members are dying at disproportionate and exponential rates. Those most impacted by these ongoing tragedies have the wisdom that houses solutions to the overlapping oppression against poor and racialized communities. As Christians may we be challenged and transformed by God-with-us, who identified God’s very self with those most impacted by systemic oppression, trauma and social neglect.

“Whoever oppresses a poor person insults their Creator, but they who are generous to the needy honour their Maker.” (Proverbs 14:31)

Sister Laura, a houseless community leader and co-founder with Papa Smith of the street-based community care initiative “Harmonization” comments on the relentless and tragic loss of her friends:  “What I see is pure madness, the government treats people who live on the street, who don’t deserve to live on the street, so badly. The housing crisis and covid crisis has turned Toronto into a violent war on the street, the city is at war against us. 

“So many of my friends have died on the streets from drug use, so many have died by suicide. This is supposed to be a good place to live. The younger generation is our future to keep our veterans and elderly people safe from harm’s way, from sickness, bad drugs and sh**** housing. Canada has a racist issue. I, Sister Laura, support the grief and loss group in Toronto, Trinity Church supports me, I march forward every day and think every day of everyone around the world who has passed away from homelessness. I pray for the angels to protect everyone on Earth and for our younger generation to keep peace, goodwill and happiness, and have freedom to love and treat people as human beings.” 

The constant grief and burden of loss has been extremely heavy on our communities in this time, but in times of unprecedented suffering we are called to deepen our commitment to solidarity, in honour of all whom we have loved and lost. Indeed, above the Homeless Memorial, which crumbles under the weight of over 1,000 names, are the words “FIGHT FOR THE LIVING” written in chalk on the church wall. 

The Rev. Leigh Kern is the diocese’s right relations coordinator.

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Over the holidays, we received many calls from our community members currently incarcerated in Ontario’s prisons and jails describing their experience during COVID-19. Currently, there are active outbreaks at all primary prisons across the province. As many readers are aware, we have been advocating for the human rights of prisoners, calling for a change to the negligence of care for their physical well-being and a lack of healthcare that often exacerbates treatable and manageable conditions. During the pandemic, these conditions have become much, much worse and we see a system reeling as it tries to implement basic public health measures to prevent the spread of the virus.

From our conversation with prisoners, one of the first prisons to see the outbreak was OCI (Ontario Correctional Institute) in the mid-spring of 2020. This is a prison that is primarily focused on mental health and substance use rehabilitation, where many go to take programs that would divert them from longer sentences. One of the main vectors of disease in the prison system are the staff and security officers who move between the prison environment and the community. Soon after the beginning of COVID-19, all prisons implemented lockdown measures that disallowed family and community support from visiting the inmates. In spite of this measure, there was a large outbreak that began at this prison facility. The remedy for this outbreak was to augment OCI’s population by sending its prisoners to other regional prisons. This then led to the outbreak being spread across several institutions, with one of the hardest hit being the Toronto South Detention Centre. To mitigate the further spread of the virus within this facility, the administration instituted lockdown procedures (meaning that prisoners are locked in their cell for an extended duration), and discontinued programs and essential services. For prisoners, this has meant that they have had no access to laundry, cleaning products, running water or personal protective equipment. Even more challenging, during this time of great upheaval and anxiety, all typical connections to families and supports have been taken away, replaced with a courtesy phone card that allows for about two 15-minute phone calls per day to a landline. In Canada’s prisons, the deplorable conditions and response to the pandemic are only mounting, and little is being done to remedy this accelerating crisis.

These same conditions are also mirrored at the federal level, where prisoners serve sentences greater than two years. We received a call on New Year’s Eve from a prisoner who is a health organizer, who had just been let out of lockdown after more than a month of being confined to a unit. The inmate indicated that all federal prisons in Ontario now have outbreaks. This spread was caused by the shipping of COVID-19-positive people from the intake unit at Joyceville prison in Kingston to other institutions across the province in mid-December. This was done to clear space for intakes from provincial prisons. At the time of the transfers, staff knew there was an outbreak at Joyceville greater than 30 people, and their response was to ship people to other institutions to make more room for the intake.

Now, with massive and uncontrolled outbreaks in provincial prisons, this will quickly overwhelm the federal jails, which are often located in smaller communities with less health infrastructure. There is not adequate access to healthcare in the prison system, with shared sanitation, lack of ventilators, at most two infectious disease nurses at each institution, and very little isolation space.

In December alone, more than 1,400 prisoners in Canada contracted COVID-19 in prison. In demonstration for their health rights, prisoners have led a hunger strike campaign, and have invited you to join them by abstaining for food for one day and lifting up their calls for dignity and healthcare to your Member of Parliament. This is an issue that we can all lend our voices to, even in ways that seem small. Prisoners are members of our families, communities and the Body of Christ. They are not disposable.

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“There has been almost no public reporting or conversation about this blatant act of disrespect and collective callousness by our public officials. The state and its agents can treat Black death as our natural state, devoid of any sanctity or need for care. Such neglect mirrors White indifference to our living struggle, and demonstrates that, within the context of this global White supremacist nightmare, our lives do not matter.”

More than 10 people of colour have been killed by Canadian police since the beginning of 2020. Grief-stricken and overwhelmed by the voracity of loss, I reached out to fellow clergy for prayer, support, and solidarity. The only person to reply to my plea was the Rev. Jacqueline Daley, the priest-in-charge of St. Margaret, New Toronto, and co-chair of Black Anglicans of Canada. In response to the killing of George Floyd, Black Anglicans of Canada had begun a weekly Wednesday night webinar series on confronting anti-Black racism. In our grief-thick conversation, Jacqueline generously offered to share this platform with Toronto Urban Native Ministry (TUNM). We held a joint meeting with community leaders from the Black and Indigenous communities, built relationships, and together developed a three-part series titled “Anti-Black and Anti-Indigenous Racism: Shared Pathway Series.” We also brought our hearts together to host a joint worship service of “Lament for Lives Lost” on July 19, which can be viewed at any time in the video section of TUNM’s Facebook page. The worship service featured songs of lament from Black and Indigenous traditions, a riveting sermon by Jacqueline, and prayers for all killed by police violence in our beloved communities.

Within the pandemic of COVID-19, our communities are also responding to the ongoing pandemics of anti-Black and anti-Indigenous racism. Though we have not been able to gather in person, we have found new ways of grieving, praying, and resisting together. Our Shared Pathways Series held three online webinars throughout the month of September and has been viewed by hundreds of people. Participants “zoomed in” from all over the world, from the Caribbean to the United Kingdom. All webinars from the series can be viewed on the Black Anglicans of Canada YouTube page.

In these sessions, we learned from diverse voices about how Indigenous and Black people were both enslaved in the first several centuries of colonization. We learned how, after emancipation in Canada, Indigenous communities helped hide Black people escaping the tortures of slavery and seeking the underground railroad to freedom – how they shared pathways of liberation. We learned how Black and Indigenous communities are not separate, but deeply and intimately connected. We learned how Black clergy are overwhelmingly underemployed and unsupported in our Church; we dreamed together on decolonizing and shifting power dynamics in the Kin-dom of God. We learned from women who are both Black and Indigenous, from Aleshia Johnson of Osgoode Law School and Monica Forrester, Director of Trans Pride Toronto, about their experiences of racism and tools of resilience. Throughout the series, we co-conspired how we can build solidarity across Black and Indigenous experiences, to support each other in building spaces of transformation as we confront White supremacist violence against our community members.

These dialogues, our joint worship service, and the wisdom of Black Anglicans co-chairs Lance Wilson and the Rev. Jacqueline Daley, brought me into a deeper awareness of our living God. I encourage you to engage the 11 webinars that Black Anglicans of Canada has created since the series began in the wake of the murder of George Floyd. Amplify Black leadership by sharing their series with your parish, friends, and communities.

I close with a prayer by Brother Reginald Crenshaw from the third episode of our Shared Pathways Series: “We thank the Holy Spirit for being present among us, for allowing us to break our silence, allowing us to have this kind of conversation… inspire us to continue to have these conversations, to continue to organize, to continue to heal, and disrupt, and lead. Amen.”

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The welcome service was created to spiritually support Indigenous peoples, many of whom in Toronto were displaced through the Indian Residential Schools system and forced apprehensions that took children away from their families and home communities. TUNM was established as an ecumenical initiative between the United Church of Canada and the Diocese of Toronto in 2001, which was reflected in the shared liturgy of the welcome service.

Bishop Andrew Asbil presided over the service, along with co-celebrants the Rt. Rev. Richard Bott (Moderator of the United Church of Canada), the Rev. Evan Smith (Anishnawbe, TUNM and the United Church of Canada), the Rev. Maggie Dieter (Cree, the United Church of Canada) and Bishop Riscylla Shaw (Métis, area bishop of Trent-Durham). Four celebrants celebrated on four sides of the altar, speaking from the four directions as they prayed the Peacemaker Eucharistic Prayer, a liturgical resource created by the Anglican Council of Indigenous Peoples.

National Indigenous Archbishop Mark MacDonald preached, highlighting how the work of TUNM through the generations has called Indigenous, newcomers and settler peoples to lift the veil of colonial vision that feeds the “culture of money” and return to the vision of the Creator. The vision of our God is one where humans, the land and all created beings are seen with the eyes of God, valued inherently with dignity instead of how they relate to profit as a resource. As Archbishop MacDonald preached, community members offered hollers and shouts, accenting his points and filling the church with cries of affirmation.

During the offertory, members of TUNM and Holy Trinity exchanged gifts, memorializing their new relationship. William Whitla and the Rev. Sherman Hesselgrave of Holy Trinity created and presented a hymn written specially for the occasion, “God of the Blazing Sun and the Moon.” The Rev. Evan Smith presented them in turn with a carved wooden bowl and spoon, mounted on a plaque to honour the Dish with One Spoon Covenant between the Haudenoshone and the Anishnawbe Nations, to peacefully share and sustain the life of the Great Lakes. The plaque will hang in Holy Trinity to remind all of the ancient and recent treaties of this territory, and how we are all called to live on this land in partnership with Indigenous leaders.

Following the celebration of Holy Communion, Sandra Campbell (Mohawk, Wolf Clan, TUNM Social and Pastoral Care Worker) beat her drum and sang the Travelling Song as the congregation recessed to four stations in Trinity Square park, next to the church. We began in the west, praying over the location of Taddle Creek, a buried river in Toronto. We prayed for TUNM’s Water Festival, ministry to people who give birth, to those who cry, and for our advocacy for those without access to clean water. In the north side of the park, we prayed over the site where a community member, Byron, recently died. We prayed for all we have lost in our ministry. We honoured the ancestors of the territory, and we prayed for TUNM and Holy Trinity’s shared ministry of the Homeless Memorial. In the east, we prayed over the new home of TUNM, building #6 in Trinity Square.

Bishop Asbil, Moderator Richard Bott and Archbishop MacDonald all led prayers of blessing over the historic rectory that now houses office space for the Rev. Evan Smith, Sandra Campbell and myself. In the south, we turned to face the courthouses of Toronto, praying over TUNM’s prison chaplaincy and community reintegration support programs. The celebration and establishment of a new home for this vital ministry concluded with the Mi’kmaq Welcome Song, sung by members of TUNM and the Neechee Sharing Circle.

TUNM extends its gratitude to the members of Holy Trinity, all TUNM board members, the Diocese of Toronto, the Shining Waters Regional Council, our national Indigenous ministries and the national office of the United Church of Canada for their support in establishing a new home for TUNM.

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As colonialism swept across Indigenous territories, one of the major pathways of violence against Indigenous nationhood was to lay systematic assault on Indigenous families to undermine clan systems of governance. The Church-run Indian Residential Schools stole generations of children from their loving bonds, and countless loved ones never returned home, some still lying in unmarked graves. On Sept. 30 at the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, a ceremony was held to honour those who died at the residential schools and recite some of their names, for the first time ever in public. There are not yet accurate numbers of how many children died in the residential schools. In 2015, the Unmarked Burials Working Group of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission began its investigation. It accounted for 4,200 deceased children – yet this work is far from over, as some experts estimate the number to be at least 8,000 children. I invite you in this moment to take a breath to honour those thousands of little ones who never made it home from residential school.

Canada is facing a reckoning, as the names come forward and unmarked graves are unearthed. The Canadian state was established by undermining and systemically assaulting Indigenous governance and sovereignty over this land. Concurrent with the taking of children from families is the practice of the forced sterilization of Indigenous women, girls, and Two-Spirit people. Sterilization was a punishment used to discipline girls in several residential schools. In some communities, such as Naujaat, Nunavut, 50 per cent of Inuit women of age were forcibly sterilized in the 1970s. From the 1930s to the 1970s in Alberta and British Columbia, the forced sterilization of Indigenous women was policy and practice. Tragically, forced sterilization and child apprehension are not bygone realities of the past for many Indigenous families – they are ongoing experiences. The destabilization, sterilization and forced breaking up of Indigenous families is willful policy, deliberate acts of genocide in continuum with the initial colonization of these lands and spiritual ecosystems.

The term genocide was created by Raphael Lemkin, who wrote that “colonization was in itself intrinsically genocidal.” He saw genocide as the tactics of disfiguring and destroying a community’s ability to continue and perpetuate its identity. The UN adopted his definition in 1948 and states that genocide is: “Any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) killing members of the group;

(b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

(c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

(d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

(e) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”

Canada has certainly fulfilled this definition of genocide, and still survivors continue to rise up and courageously reveal a path towards healing, justice, and truth. As Christians, we are called to proclaim the truth and pray for the mercy of God, as we have often been complicit and active in acts of terror on Indigenous bodies and bonds of love.

I honour all who grieve the loss of their children to child apprehension, the residential schools, and those who were forcibly sterilized in a genocidal act to stop the babbling voices of Indigenous babies on this land. In an era of great forces of destruction, may we rise in prayerful solidarity with all families separated by borders, prisons, detention centres, wars, ecological disasters, and all forces that attack love. Our young ones have inherited a landscape violated by colonial greed and pollution, yet their prophetic voices resound from every continent that the time to repent has come. We must awaken and change our path of exploitation, desecration, and ongoing colonialism. When Indigenous children are not held in their rightful place as sacred beings, our society spirals into deeper sickness, and requires our commitment to healing and repentance. May we all commit ourselves, our souls and bodies, to the prophet Isaiah’s dream, that all beings of creation shall be at peace with each other and a little child shall lead. Amen, so be it.

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