Indian residential schools. Unmarked graves and the apology from Pope Francis. Introduction

• Main Author: Milandri Raffaella
• Format: Book Part
• Language: English
• Published: Zenodo 2023
• Subjects: residential schools; unmarked graves; pope francis; native american; First Nations; inuit; Metis
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8175493

An investigative book shedding light on the Indian residential school system, the unmarked graves of Native children discovered in 2021 in Canada, and thoroughly analyzing Pope Francis' 2022 apology and penitential trip and the Catholic Church's involvement. In late May 2021 a media wave, soon to spread globally, announced the findings of unmarked graves of Native students from Indian residential schools in Canada. Thus, the Indian boarding school system, widespread in North America from the second half of the nineteenth century until the late twentieth century, the Churches that ran such government-funded schools, including the predominant Catholic one, and the Canadian government were being publicly indicted. The work goes on to analyze the origins and spread of the educational system of assimilation and Christianization aimed at Native Americans and Canadians, the various - and tragic - government reports and testimonies that denounced its disciplinary methods beginning in the early twentieth century, and then the pressure exerted on the Pope to "apologize" to the Natives on behalf of the Catholic Church for the abuse and violence perpetrated in such schools. Between late March and late July 2022 Pope Francis, first receiving a Canadian indigenous delegation at the Vatican, and then going in person on a penitential journey on Canadian soil, met with First Nations, Metis, and Inuit communities and faced much criticism, but also garnered support. At the end of his trip, he said that his treatment of the Natives was "genocide." The pope's words and his apology, analyzed and weighed by the media and academia, certainly turned the spotlight on the serious human rights problems of Indigenous Peoples and the responsibilities of colonialism.