In its March 30 response, the USCCB said the statement marks “yet another step in expressing concern and pastoral solicitude for Native and Indigenous peoples who have experienced tremendous suffering because of the legacy of a colonizing mentality.”
Pope Francis has made progress in healing long-damaged relations between the Catholic Church and Indigenous peoples.
Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican secretary of state, told world leaders Nov. 8 that “the growing phenomenon of migrants being displaced” by climate change is something they must act on because currently “they lack access to international protection” recognizing them as deserving special care.
Pope Francis said the church’s involvement in the schools was the reason why he met in late March and early April at the Vatican with “representatives of Indigenous peoples, to whom I expressed my sorrow and solidarity for the harm they have suffered.”
“Walking Together” is the theme of Pope Francis’ July 24-29 visit to Canada’s Indigenous peoples.
The pope is holding three meetings to listen to the experiences of representatives of Canada’s Indigenous communities, experiences that include being sent as children to residential schools operated by Catholic dioceses and religious orders.
Bishop Douglas Lucia, whose downtown Syracuse office sits on the ancestral lands of the Onondaga Nation, hopes to meet with Pope Francis “to re-examine” 15th-century Vatican documents that justified colonization, land takeovers and oppression of Indigenous peoples.
The Mexican government and some survivors of a notorious massacre of Indigenous peoples by paramilitaries will sign an “amicable agreement” that includes an apology and reparations
