It is said that church and politics don’t mix but what happens when church politics prevents the pope of the Roman Catholic Church from doing what's right?
Former premier Stephen Kakfwi told News/North last week the non-apology from the pope for the Catholic Church's role in overseeing residential schools smacks of a struggle between the pope and the Vatican bureaucracy.
Pope Francis expressed in a statement released March 27 by the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops that he could not “respond personally to call to action 58” of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and that his “priority is the work of reconciliation being done at the local level.”
That work has not only been done over the years prior to the commission’s recommendations but remains ongoing with the Catholic Church in Canada.
In 2009, Murray Chatlain, the former bishop of the Diocese of Mackenzie and Fort Smith, offered an apology regarding his church’s role with residential schools and the generational suffering that resulted.
“The sad part for me is that our Church has played a significant role in that suffering,” he stated. “I want to apologize for: our disruption of families and parenting, our involvement in the devaluing of aboriginal language, culture and spirituality, our association with the Government of Canada in their policy of assimilation and our failure to protect children from serious physical and sexual abuse.”
Murray, though not personally involved with residential schools, understood the pain suffered by Indigenous people and how an apology not only acknowledges that pain but lays the groundwork for healing.
Reconciliation once occurred at the Vatican level as well. Pope Francis' predecessor, Pope John Paul II, fulfilling a promise to visit the Northwest Territories after an earlier attempt was thwarted by poor weather, told the northern faithful gathered in Fort Simpson in 1984 that, “It is time for forgiveness, for reconciliation and for a commitment to building new relationships … And I also condemn physical, cultural, and religious oppression and all that would in anyway deprive you or any group of what rightly belongs to you.”
But that was then. 1984 was long time ago, too far back to influence the discussions on residential schools that are occurring today.
Current bishop for Mackenzie and Fort Smith, Jon Hansen, admits he is disappointed with by the lack of apology from Pope Francis but said the pope’s record shows he is sensitive to the issue and the decision may be out of his control.
That is cold comfort for Indigenous adherents to the church who will undoubtedly question the pope's sincerity going forward.
Kakfwi suggests Indigenous leaders should press the issue, travel to the Vatican and insist the pope visit and apologize in person.
The pope's refusal to apologize may very well be about internal church politics. If so, it's bad politics. The only thing the non-apology will accomplish is to further resentment among loyal Catholics in Indigenous communities while weakening bonds that would make the pope's apology meaningful.