Sep 30
On any given Monday out at the jail, anywhere from 25-40 percent of the guys who come out to the chapels are indigenous. Given that they make up around 6-7 percent of the Alberta population, that’s some bad math. Actually, “bad” is not a strong enough word. It’s heartbreaking. And it’s angry making. And it’s frustrating. And it’s demoralizing. And… well, pick your adjective. It’s not good. It is a reality that should not be. Read more
I attended the funeral of my childhood pastor yesterday. He was well into his nineties, had lived a good, long life whose shape was defined by faith and family. I didn’t know him well. I’m not sure that knowing the pastor well would have even been on my childhood radar as something desirable or even possible. The pastor was kind of like the librarian or the Zamboni driver at the ice rink—someone who was just always there. His sermons were not particularly riveting, nor did he exude charisma from the pulpit. He was just this stable given in my life. Actually, I should check that pernicious word “just.” In a world where so many lives are characterized by instability, chaos and confusion, where so much communication is reduced to marketing and manipulation, where so many relationships are temporary and self-serving, we could probably all use a few more stable unspectacular givens in our lives. Read more
I remember the first time I saw the image to my left. It was almost exactly eight years ago on my first of two learning tours to the West Bank and Israel. On both tours, we visited the Aida refugee camp in between Bethlehem, Beit Jala, and Jerusalem. On both occasions we paused at the gate and pondered this haunting image of a giant key. The symbolism was explained to us. Many families in this camp still have the keys to the homes from which they fled or were forcibly displaced during one of the wars that attended the founding of the nation of Israel. The key is a symbol of the memory of this trauma and of the hope that they will one day return. Read more
Last year I was poking around in a cool little bookstore in the Rocky Mountain town of Canmore when I happened upon a little book called What Comes from Spirit by the late Ojibway author Richard Wagamese. Wagamese is best known for books like Indian Horse, Medicine Walk, and One Native Life. I had the opportunity to meet Richard in 2014 when I hosted an event he was speaking at. I remember him as a very soft-spoken and gentle man. And a great storyteller. Read more
Today is the second annual National Day for Truth and Reconciliation in Canada. It’s officially been declared a “federal holiday,” but if/how provinces and private businesses observe it is uneven and inconsistent. Some people get a holiday, some don’t. I’m at work for at least part of today doing the usual things, preparing for Sunday, getting ready for a meeting, taking care of some admin details. Today is also Orange Shirt Day, an informal awareness day that preceded the NDTR (two days for the price of one!). Again, some wear orange, some don’t. Like everything else in our world, if and how we observe these things is relentlessly moralized and politicized and polarized. Read more
So, the pope has been in my home province of Alberta this week. I’m not a Roman Catholic, so this obviously isn’t quite the momentous occasion for me that it might be for some of my Catholic sisters and brothers, but still, it’s a fairly big deal, not least because of one of the main reasons for his visit. He’s here to apologize, on Canadian soil, to indigenous people for the ugly history and legacy of residential schools. It is a “pilgrimage of penance,” in Francis’s own words, a time to unequivocally repent for the sins of the church and for the deep and lasting harm that they have caused. Read more
My daughter and I were invited on a podcast a while back where the topic was “reconciliation.” What is it, how do you work for it, what shape ought it to take, etc. Would we be interested? Well sure. But we were both quite clear when the invitation came that we did not see our relationship as some kind of abstract exercise in reconciliation but as a father and a daughter. We were not placeholders for a theory of racial relations. We were family. Read more
One does not need to be an apologist for the Roman Catholic Church or for the Government of Canada or for the wretched legacy of Indian Residential schools to be alarmed at and deeply troubled by the spate of recent church burnings that have taken place across Canada. I probably should not need to begin a post with a sentence like that—i.e., it should be fairly unremarkable that a person could feel grief and anger toward historical injustices perpetrated by the church and simultaneously be convinced that burning houses of worship to the ground is wrong—but such are the times we live in. We are forever sorting one another into moral categories. It can be a risky thing to risk the wrath of the online mob by expressing the wrong moral sentiment. Or the right moral sentiment directed toward the wrong group. Or the right moral sentiment expressed with the wrong degree of certainty or outrage. Or… well, you’ve presumably been online in the last few years. You get the idea. Read more
It’s the early hours of what promises to be a blistering hot Canada Day. I’m sitting at my laptop, drinking my morning coffee, wearing an orange t-shirt. As you likely know, at least if you live in Canada, the orange t-shirt has come to become a symbol of solidarity with our indigenous neighbours, specifically those who endured residential schools. The idea for the orange t-shirt emerges out of the experience of a young indigenous girl who was given an orange shirt by her grandmother to wear on her first day at a Residential School in British Columbia. The shirt was confiscated, and she never saw it again. Read more
Hi kids,
Remember how last year I said I was done writing these rambling birthday letters to you now that you are adults? Well, I lied. You can add this latest transgression to the sad list that I’ve accumulated over nearly two decades as your father. Each year on this day I tend to dissolve into a puddle of sentimental nostalgia mixed in with a generous dose of neurotic longing for your futures and, naturally, this garbled mess has to find expression somewhere, right? You’ll thank me for this later, no doubt. Ahem. Read more
I’ve hesitated to say much in response to the grim spectacle of America ablaze with protests against the racism, police brutality, and appalling murder of George Floyd last week in Minneapolis. My justifications for silence often wander down familiar trails. What can I say that others can’t say or haven’t already said better? I’m not American; what right do I have to say anything about a social reality that is not my own? What good does adding to an amorphous chorus of condemnation/white guilt really do? Isn’t ninety percent of what’s going online today a flailing combination of virtue signalling and emoting out loud? What good is one more wagging white finger against racism? Read more
I am learning that the jail is very often a place where simple narratives go to die.
This morning’s lesson was ostensibly about learning how to stop blaming parents and take responsibility for our own actions but, as is usually the case, the conversation tends to meander off in all kinds of loosely-related or unrelated territory. There was a younger indigenous woman who was sitting quietly while the lesson was read. She had spiky jet black hair streaked with blond, a few tattoos on her face, one that looked like a tear drop of blood. I wouldn’t have been surprised if she sat in stony silence throughout our time together. She didn’t look like she had much to say. Read more
I left the jail this morning feeling a heaviness that I have not felt in some time. I don’t go there each Monday with some big agenda—I’m not there to reform or convert or instruct, but to listen, to pray, to encourage. But most days, I get a glimpse of goodness through a conversation, a smile, a new insight into the human heart and the human predicament. Today was not one of those days. Read more
Only two guys showed up for the support group at the jail today. There had been some kind of a disturbance in the unit, apparently, and so it was twenty-five minutes past start time when the pair of them trudged in. One was an older guy who seemed reserved and didn’t say much. The other was a young Cree man who talked a mile a minute and seemed delighted to be anywhere other than his cell. Brandon* introduced himself to me three times, a vigorous handshake accompanying each introduction, before we settled in to the circle. Read more
My daughter and I were sitting at the streetside window of a local café this afternoon when a couple of quite spectacularly drunk guys walked up to the front door. One of them started screaming at the door, middle finger enthusiastically raised in glorious salute. He looked over at us, grinned weirdly and then returned his attentions to the front door. More middle fingers, more yelling, and then the unpleasant culmination of his hostilities: he leaned back and spit on the front door before stumbling away. Read more
I get defensive when I listen to episodes like the one that aired today on a special edition of The Current. I’m not particularly proud of my instinctive reaction, but there you go. The episode was called “In Care and In Crisis: Canada’s Indigenous Child Welfare Emergency.” It deals with the deeply troubling realities faced by indigenous kids across Canada who are removed from the care of their biological parents and placed into foster care. The word “crisis” is no overstatement for the present situation. If you have any doubt (and care bear the heart-rending sadness), read this piece from yesterday. Read more
The last few days have been full of expressions of patriotism and anti-patriotism. Canada’s 150th birthday was on Saturday. Today, obviously, is the big day for our American neighbours. The internet is, predictably, aflame with either nationalistic chest-thumping or withering criticisms thereof. There is, of course, plenty to be critical of. Canada continues to come to terms with and be confronted by its treatment of indigenous people, historically right down to the present. The USA struggles with all things Donald Trump and his “America First” agenda that seems content to kick a whole bunch of people to the curb. I suspect that no matter the insignia on our passport, many of us feel at least a little bit conflicted when it comes to waving the flag. And if we don’t, we should. Especially if we are Christians. As followers of Jesus, our national identities ought always to be worn loosely given our primary convictions and commitments to Christ and to his kingdom. Read more
All across the nation today, there will be ceremonies commemorating National Aboriginal Day (or what will soon be National Indigenous People’s Day, according to Justin Trudeau). There will be dancing and singing and regalia and official speeches by important people in city centers from sea to sea to sea. There will be earnest expressions of regret for Canada’s historical treatment of indigenous people and celebrations of how ancient cultures and languages are being reclaimed. There will be talk of honouring diversity and respecting treaties. There will be solemn pledges to do better going forward. Read more
Rumblings 