One of the paths they identified was “bridge-building” among religions and traditions and also “principled engagement with governments” and nongovernmental agencies on issues of human rights, eradication of poverty, human trafficking, care of the earth, and other common concerns.
Exploring their sacraments, rituals and outreach that promote reconciliation with God and among people, Catholic and Methodist experts acknowledged in a new document that divided Christians “fall short of what it means to be the church.”
The pope said his reason for visiting, “was to meet the Indigenous peoples to express to them my closeness and my sorrow, and to ask for forgiveness for the harm done to them by those Christians, including many Catholics.
The pope met with government, civic and Indigenous leaders at the fortress, the official residence of the governor general of Canada.
Pope Francis delivered his apology on the treaty land of the Ermineskin and Samson Cree Nations, the Louis Bull Tribe and the Montana First Nation, as part of his “penitential pilgrimage” to Canada.
While presented as missionary work, the operation of residential schools by Catholics in Canada was actually an attempt to impose European culture on Canada’s Indigenous people, Pope Francis said.
Pope Francis himself described the trip as a “penitential pilgrimage” to express, in person and on Canadian soil, his “indignation, sorrow and shame for all that these people suffered.”
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.”
