Catholic Church has plenty to apologize for

Last week, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau met with Pope Francis in the Vatican. The meeting was private, but Trudeau and the Pope discussed a wide range of topics and First Nations reconciliation was among them. Trudeau also asked the pontiff if he would be prepared to make a formal apology to the First Nations for the sad legacy of boarding schools.

This was among one of the calls to action issued by the truth and reconciliation commission in its final report.

The majority of the boarding schools were Catholic and run by the Oblate Fathers or the Missionary Order of Mary Immaculate. This order was founded in France and members travelled throughout the French colonies doing missionary work for the church.

All the boarding schools were run by one missionary order or another and reflected their zeal to Christianize the Indians.

The Pope has yet to make a formal reply to the prime minister’s request. There was no reply other than it would be considered. While the Pope is contemplating this request, he had better consider some of the many other travesties done in the name of the church.

The history of the Americas is one of conquest, deceit and genocide. The British, Portuguese and Spanish did the most damage. The Spanish especially conquered most of Central and South America, laying waste to civilizations in their greed for gold and other riches.

A few years ago we were on vacation in Mexico and we decided to take a day trip to the historic site of Chichen Itza. On our way, we stopped at the city of Valladolid and went to the main town square. The cathedral dominated the city centre and our guide told us that stone from a Mayan pyramid was used in its construction. The cathedral was beautiful, but I couldn’t help wondering about what the pyramid must have looked like or the significance it held to the people.

Earlier, I had visited Cuzco, Peru, which was the ancient capital of the Inca Empire. The Spanish Conquistadores looted the city and held the Inca emperor for ransom and later killed him.

To make sure their victory was complete, the beautiful temple to the sun was razed and a cathedral built on its foundations. Today, if you walk around to the back of the cathedral, you can see the distinctive rounded stones that formed the Temple of the Sun.

While the church’s actions in the New World are now considered a travesty, they came by it honestly. They have a long history of appropriating other religious holidays and using former buildings as quarries for their church construction.

Christians may celebrate Christmas as the birth of Jesus, but the real date is unknown and the church piggybacked on Saturnalia, which was the Roman feast to honour the god Saturn. Saturnalia was a lively festival of drinking and feasting that lasted seven days at the end of December. The church decided to put an end to the fun and turned it into a Christian holiday.

In Alberta, there is a lake to the west of Edmonton that was sacred to the First Nations. Traditionally, in pre-Columbian times, people would gather by its shores and conduct religious ceremonies. The Catholic Church renamed it Lac Ste. Anne, which is said to be the name of Jesus’s grandmother. Today the tradition continues with a huge pilgrimage there every summer.

A few years ago we visited Rome, and one of the churches we saw was the basilica called Santa Maria Maggiori. This beautiful church is one of the city’s great basilicas. The interior has gold gilt on the ceiling and walls. The guidebook stated that the gilded ceiling was a gift from King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain to Pope Alexander VI at the end of the 15th century. Apparently it was from the first shipment of gold that Columbus brought from the Americas. This would be gold that Columbus got from the enslavement of the Indians on the Island of Hispaniola.

Later would come the Aztec gold, followed by Inca gold — so much that Spain would become a very rich country with colonies throughout the Americas. The church played a major role in the conquest of the Americas, and the Pope has a lot to apologize for if he wants true reconciliation.