After the announcement by the T’kemlups First Nation of the discovery of so-called unmarked graves at the site of the former Kamloops residential school, many politicians, Indigenous leaders, and media have thrown aside balance, restraint, and caution, turning truth into a casualty.
Public discussion about residential schools is now either totally false or grossly exaggerated.
Canada is accused of the most heinous crimes, with some even accusing our country of committing genocide. A more balanced picture of residential schools is the only road to genuine Reconciliation.
True North is proud to partner with Dorchester Books to publish Grave Error: How the Media Misled Us (and The Truth about Residential Schools) by Dr. Tom Flanagan and Dr. C.P. Champion.
This excellent collection of first rate articles challenges the false narrative surrounding Canada’s residential schools and treatment of Indigenous Canadians.
An early 20th century photo of the cemetery associated with the St. Mary’s IRS, Kenora, Ontario, showing wooden grave markers of students that were allowed to disintegrate over time, proving that students were given a proper Christian (Catholic) burial.
“We must protect the truth.” That’s what Kimberly Murray gave as her motive for demanding those she called “residential school deniers” be criminally prosecuted or subjected to civil liability for raising questions about unmarked graves and other related topics that Murray and her colleagues find uncomfortable. Murray believes anyone who questions claims made by anyone who attended a residential school about unmarked graves, or who claims that anything positive came from residential schools should fall into this criminally and civilly punishable “denier” category.
But there are problems with this.
In the first place, if saying that anything positive came from residential school attendance is a crime, it would put many indigenous people who attended residential schools in legal jeopardy — even the people who wrote the Truth and Reconciliation Report. Because even that report contains a section titled “Warm Memories” that contains only positive accounts of indigenous residential school attendees who remember their years at residential school fondly, and credit their school attendance for their success in life.
That section is short, but there are hundreds of other personal accounts — and even entire books — of people who speak of how their attendance changed their lives for the better. The best book written by a residential school attendee is “Permanent Astonishment” by acclaimed indigenous playwright, writer and pianist Tomson Highway. In the book, Highway describes his experience at the Guy Hill Residential School in northern Manitoba as “nine of the best years of my life” during which he not only acquired the skills he needed to become an internationally acclaimed author, but learned to play the first piano he had ever seen, and developed his skills to a professional level. Many other important indigenous leaders received the educations that equipped them to succeed at residential schools.
So, if merely stating the truth — namely that some people benefited from their residential school experience — becomes a criminal offence, expect to see some of Canada’s most successful indigenous leaders in the criminal dock.
But there are other problems as well, because Kimberly Murray wants to criminalize anyone who raises questions about what residential school “survivors” have claimed to be the truth. Readers will recall that two years ago the Kamloops chief and her colleagues claimed that 215 graves had been discovered containing the remains of 215 children who had died under sinister circumstances at the school, and who had been secretly buried — with the forced help of six year olds. Almost immediately copy-cat claims followed, with allegations that there were thousands of such “missing children” buried all across the country.
Senior indigenous leaders weighed in with allegations that there were “tens of thousands” and “25,000-maybe more” such “missing children.” ‘Survivors’ claimed they had personally observed priests clubbing indigenous children to death and throwing them into pits; that dead indigenous children were hung on meat hooks in barns; that the bodies of indigenous children were “tossed into rivers, lakes and streams,” and even that Queen Elizabeth herself had kidnapped ten indigenous children from the Kamloops School.
But if Kimberly Murray gets her way, and anyone who questions any of these claims becomes a criminal, they had better start building more jails. Because there is not a single shred of evidence that would stand up in any court that any of those fantastical claims are true. Never mind “thousands” there is no credible evidence that even one single child was murdered or secretly buried at any residential school. And it is now almost certain that the 215 “soil disturbances” detected at the Kamloops school were not graves at all, but were from previous excavations on the school grounds.
The “survivors” who made the false claims might believe that they are true. But they are not. And the fact that these stories have circulated in indigenous communities for years does not make them true.
So, Kimberly Murray’s demand that anyone who refuses to accept her odd version of reality must become a criminal will go the way of most expensively produced government reports — sitting on a dusty shelf.
Murray is right about one thing — “We must protect the truth.” Indeed. But we do that not by making criminals of those who ask questions. Instead, we welcome those questions.
Indian Lobbyist Wants to Make Questioning Residential School Claims A Criminal Offence & Justice Lametti Seems to Agree
In this age, victimhood is a prize commodity.. With it, a group can induce guilt into tenderhearted Europeans and with guilt comes entitlement and money. The organized Jewish lobby from the 1970s on, used the story of their sufferings in World War II — the so-called holocaust — to pry immense sums of money from Germany. (Germany just allocated another $1.5-billion to survivors. It’s been 78 years since the end of WW II!)
Guilt, though is a useful tool. The press is immensely sympathetic to Jewish interests. Canadians are meant to feel guilty about the so-called holocaust even though it didn’t happen here, it didn’t happen to Canadians, and Canada didn’t do it. Indeed, Canada fought against those who caused Jewish suffering.
Nevertheless, we have Holocaust Remembrance Day and Month and a Holocaust Monument. So powerful has this guilt tripping been that the holocaust has become almost a religion imposed by Western elites that sneer at Christianity.
However, there were soon pesky questions challenging the numbers and many other claims of the victim narrative from some former detention camp inmates (Rassinier), from scientists (Leuchter, Butz, Faurrison, Luftl, Rudolf) and historians (Irving) The power of the guilt message depends on emotionalism. Rational questions are disruptive.
So, the victim group demands that any questioning of its victim narrative be silenced or criminalized. Questioning the Hollywood version of World War II can get you five years in prison in Germany and many other European countries.Last year, Trudeau, he who smashed the peaceful Truckers’ Freedom Convoy with the Emergencies Act and who is no friend of free speech, snuck amendments into the budget criminalizing holocaust denial. No Member of Parliament opposed this gutting of free speech. The holocaust is now an imposed state religion in Canada. It is beyond historical or scientific discussion or skepticism. It must be believed, if one is doubtful, the skeptic must keep silent.
Well, now a spokesman for another entitled group, native Indians, is demanding that questioners of that group’s guilt narrative be silenced.
The guilt narrative suggests that Europeans abused and dispossessed the native people. oF COURSE, there certainly were frictions in the relations between the European founding/settler people of Canada and Native Indians.
The residential schools set up to educate Indian children — to help move them from the Stone Age to the edge of the Modern Age in one generation — were really attempts at genocide, oh, well, not real genocide, but cultural genocide, according to former Chief Justice Beverley McLaughlin. The Harper Government apologized and shovelled out billions of dollars in compensation. The the guilt just keeps on giving. Trudeau has flung more money under various guises to Indians. Then, two years ago a propaganda bonanza occurred. The Kamloops band said that ground penetrating radar had found what might have been 216 graves near a former residential school. The press was is full guilt-mongering propaganda mode. The finding was dubbed “mass graves”, suggesting an undignified one-time burial, perhaps even extermination. Two years later, no further investigation has occurred. Are there even graves there; if so, who is in those graves and how, if it can be determined, did they die?
The irrational guiltmongering allowed the wrecking crew who hate Old Stock Canadians et quebecois de souche to tear down statues including of Canada’s first Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald, to rename buildings and even institutions. Ryerson University, named after the father of education in Ontario, was renamed Metropolitan University and a statue of Egerton Ryerson was vandalized and beheaded. The head was later found on the Six Nations Reservation near Brantford. No charges were laid. Over 50 Christian churches were vandalized or destroyed or damaged by arson. Belatedly, Justin Trudeau said he did not condone the arson but said he understood.; Almost no charges have been laid in these attacks one of which destroyed a Coptic Christian church in Vancouver. The Copts came to Canada from Egypt AFTER the last residential school closed.
Our history needs rational discussion. If individual Indians were abused or assaulted by all means charge the perpetrators, if still alive.
However, as with the holocaust, discussion and questioning is not what is wanted. It would interrupt and dampen the very profitable guilt narrative. Thus, “Canada should give “urgent consideration” to legal mechanisms as a way to combat residential school denialism, said a Friday report from [Kimberly Murray] the independent special interlocutor on unmarked graves.
Justice Minister David Lametti said he is open to such a solution. …
In her interim report, Murray raised concerns about increasing attacks from “denialists” who challenge communities when they announce the discovery of possible unmarked graves.
‘This violence is prolific,”’ the report said. ‘And takes place via email, telephone, social media, op-eds and, at times, through in-person confrontations’.” (Canadian Press, June 16, 2023)
Notice that e-mail comments, post on social media and op eds are now labelled as “violence.”
No discussion or criticism is to be allowed: Just hang your head in guilt and shame and pay up! — Paul Fromm
These are reasonable questions.
Canada should consider legal solution to fight residential school denialism: special interlocutor
Kimberly Murray wants to see tougher action on residential school denialism
Kimberly Murray, Special Interlocuter at the first meeting for the National Gathering for Unmarked Burials
Canada should give “urgent consideration” to legal mechanisms as a way to combat residential school denialism, said a Friday report from the independent special interlocutor on unmarked graves.
Justice Minister David Lametti said he is open to such a solution.
Kimberly Murray made the call in her newly released interim report, just over a year after she was appointed to an advisory role focused on how Ottawa can help indigenous communities search for children who died and disappeared from residential schools.
Her final report is due next year and is expected to contain recommendations.
The former executive director of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada spent much of the past year travelling the country and hearing from different communities, experts and survivors.
The Liberal government created her role as it looked for ways to respond to First Nations from across Western Canada and in parts of Ontario using ground-penetrating radar to search former residential school sites for possible unmarked graves.
In her interim report, Murray raised concerns about increasing attacks from “denialists” who challenge communities when they announce the discovery of possible unmarked graves.
“This violence is prolific,” the report said. “And takes place via email, telephone, social media, op-eds and, at times, through in-person confrontations.”
Murray listed several examples, including after the May 2021 announcement by the Tk’emlups te Secwepemc Nation that ground-penetrating radar had discovered what are believed to be 215 unmarked graves at the site of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School.
The findings garnered international media attention and triggered an outpouring of grief, shock and anger from across the country, both in Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities.
Murray said in her report that on top of dealing with an onslaught of media attention, the First Nation in British Columbia had to deal with individuals entering the site itself.
“Some came in the middle of the night, carrying shovels; they said they wanted to ‘see for themselves’ if children are buried there. Denialists also attacked the community on social media.”
Kukpi7 Rosanne Casimir of Tk’emlups te Secwepemc said she no longer uses social media without heavy filters because of the intensity of the “hate and racism” she experienced, according to the report, and believes the issue needs more attention…
Murray said Canada has a role to play to combat this sentiment and that “urgent consideration” should be given to what legal tools exist to address the problem, including both civil and criminal sanctions.
Lametti, who appointed Murray to her role, said that he is open to all possibilities to fighting residential-school denialism.
He said that includes “a legal solution and outlawing it,” adding some countries have criminalized denial of the Holocaust during the Second World War.
The federal government followed suit last year, amending the Criminal Code to say someone could be found guilty if they wilfully promote antisemitism “by condoning, denying or downplaying the Holocaust.”
The measure does not apply to private conversations.
NDP MP Leah Gazan has also called for Parliament to legislate residential school denialism as hate speech.
“I recognize the damage denialism does,” Lametti said Friday as he joined the event in Cowessess First Nation by video conference.”
CAFE Joins Traditionalist Catholics to Protest the Removal of Msgr. Keenan Who Defended the Church & Residential Schools
TORONTO. June 29, 2021. About two dozen supporters of CAFE joined Traditionalist Catholics outside the Chancery of the Archdiocese of Toronto to protest the removal of Msgr Owen Keenan of Mississauga who delivered his online sermon two weeks ago denouncing media anti-Catholic bias and supporting the positive role played by residential schools in the education of young Indians. He also opposed the flying of the rainbow Gay Pride flag at Catholics schools.
Msgr. Keenan’s remarks that spooked Thomas Cardinal Collins into firing him as pastor of Merciful Redeemer Church in Mississauga and putting him on an indefinite leave of absence included: “Two-thirds of the country is blaming the church, which we love, for the tragedies that occurred there,” he said in a clip of the sermon posted to Reddit. “Now I presume that the same number would thank the church for the good that was done in those schools, but of course, that question was never asked and in fact, we are not allowed to even say that good was done in those schools.” Also, ” ‘Many people had very positive experiences at residential schools. Many people received health care and education and joyous experiences. They weren’t universally awful.’
“Cancel culture has come to the Catholic Church,” said Paul Fromm, Director of the Canadian Association for Free Expression. “When honesty and balance about the residential schools are necessities, Cardinal Collins has done the cowardly, expedient thing, appeased the rabidly anti-Catholic Fake News media, and thrown a loyal defender of the Church under the bus. Msgr. Keenan was doing the jobs Canada’s bishops should have been doing, explaining how the teachers in the residential schools sought to educate and better the Indian children and that the very likely cause of the bulk of the deaths at these schools was tuberculosis and flu, especially the deadly Spanish Flu, which killed 50,000 Canadians.” Many passersby were impressed both by the arguments and by the fact that none of the protesters were wearing masks at the sweltering, humid mid-day protest.
One sour note: A balding, portly security guard emerged from the building to confront one of the rally spokesmen. He threatened to call the police if protesters strayed off the public sidewalk onto the concrete apron in front of the building. He threatened to call the police — to deal with a peaceful protest. He went right up in the face of one of the traditional Catholics. He was told to back off. Under COVID rules people are supposed to keep six feet distance. The bullying guard accused people of not wearing masks. He was told it was outdoors and they weren’t required. Shortly afterwards two Metropolitan Toronto Police arrived on bicycles. After a short discussion, they were assured of the purpose of the protest and eventually moved off.
The discovery of human remains at the site of a former residential school has set off a firestorm that has already resulted in demands for another national inquiry, and massively expensive forensic and excavation projects. But maybe we should take a pause, and ask some questions.
The Kamloops Indian Residential School operated as a residential school from 1890 to 1969. Its peak enrolment was around 500 in the 1950s. Although there has understandably been an outpouring of sympathy, it is not clear at this point how many of the bodies detected were residential students. It’s also not clear that there was even anything sinister about the discovery.
In fact, it is shocking that many people seem quite willing to accept slanderous conspiracy theories about teachers and priests murdering, and secretly burying, hundreds of children. There are many forgotten cemeteries in Canada. It is far more likely that the deaths simply reflected the sad reality of life back then. We should take a look at the history.
Tuberculosis was a major killer, and it didn’t spare children. From 1890 until the 1950s it was responsible for many child deaths. Influenza was also a particularly deadly disease for indigenous people. The 1918 Spanish flu killed a disproportionate number of indigenous people, but even ordinary influenza was particularly deadly for them. Other diseases that have all but disappeared now, like Whooping Cough, Meningitis and Measles, routinely took yesterday’s children.
Disease took many from every demographic, but indigenous people suffered most. They died mainly in their home communities, where the Grim Reaper was always close by. Infected children entered residential schools, and infected others. Many died.
In our comfortable times we forget how hard life was a hundred and more years ago – Dickens’ world of chimney sweeps, and the Poor House. Stories are now being written about Canada’s “Home Children”, for example. These were mainly English orphans, and children from poor homes, who were taken from their parents and sent by themselves to Canada. Little children – some as young as seven – would arrive with cardboard signs around their necks advertising their free labour.
Boys would be taken by farmers and used as labour, in return for their keep. The girls would be used as domestic workers. Some received good treatment – some were treated very badly. Many died alone and forgotten. It is a coincidence that the number of “Home Children” roughly equaled the total number of children who attended residential schools – 150,000.
The Home Children are one example only of the sadness that was part of the lives of all poor children who had the misfortune to be born in those times. Indigenous children suffered more than most. This historical snippet in no way mitigates the importance of the Kamloops discovery. But we should consider the harshness of previous times, before letting emotion overtake good sense.
The dead should be appropriately honoured, but we should be mindful that some opportunists will exploit these dead children for financial and political gain. The residential school story has now been exhaustively told. Canadians have heard it – and we get it. We have sympathized, and billions of dollars have been paid by people, most of whom weren’t alive then, to people who mostly weren’t either.
Brian Giesbrecht, retired judge, is a senior fellow at the Frontier Centre for Public Policy.
THE LATEST VICTIM OF CANCEL CULTURE: Monsignor Owen Keenan Said Residential Schools Did Much Good & is Now Under Fire from the Anti-Catholics & the Woke
Social Sharing
Clips of last Sunday’s controversial sermon widely criticized on social media
Samantha Beattie · CBC News · Posted: Jun 24, 2021 5:00 AM ET | Last Updated: June 24
Rev. Owen Keenan, a Roman Catholic priest in Mississauga, Ont., west of Toronto, gives daily mass at the Merciful Redeemer Parish on June 15, 2021. He is under fire for comments about residential schools he made in a recent sermon. (Merciful Redeemer Parish/YouTube)
A Mississauga, Ont., priest is under fire after a sermon referencing the “good done” by the Roman Catholic Church in residential schools, saying some might go so far as to even thank it.
During his sermon at the Merciful Redeemer Parish last Sunday, Monsignor Owen Keenan referenced the Kamloops, B.C., residential school where the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation reported it had discovered the preliminary remains of more than 200 children in unmarked graves in May.
“Two-thirds of the country is blaming the church, which we love, for the tragedies that occurred there,” he said on a video originally posted to the church’s YouTube page but since deleted. Clips of his sermon continue to circulate on social media.
“I presume the same number would thank the church for the good done in those schools, but of course, that question was never asked and we are not allowed to even say that good was done there. I await to see what comes to my inbox.”
‘Extremely harmful to reconciliation’
A clip of Keenan’s comments sparked outrage on social media, with one person tweeting that the priest’s comments were “really disgusting” and that “the Church is not the victim.” https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-0&features=eyJ0ZndfZXhwZXJpbWVudHNfY29va2llX2V4cGlyYXRpb24iOnsiYnVja2V0IjoxMjA5NjAwLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X2hvcml6b25fdHdlZXRfZW1iZWRfOTU1NSI6eyJidWNrZXQiOiJodGUiLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X3R3ZWV0X2VtYmVkX2NsaWNrYWJpbGl0eV8xMjEwMiI6eyJidWNrZXQiOiJjb250cm9sIiwidmVyc2lvbiI6bnVsbH19&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1407034853208563719&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cbc.ca%2Fnews%2Fcanada%2Ftoronto%2Fmississauga-pastor-catholic-church-residential-schools-1.6077248&sessionId=6d223c00a2342d68bbddc4c179704f7fb0073c3e&siteScreenName=cbc&theme=light&widgetsVersion=82e1070%3A1619632193066&width=550px
Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie, a practising Catholic, said she was “extremely disappointed” by her pastor’s comments about residential schools.
Reading from a prepared statement at a news conference Thursday, the mayor called Keenan’s homily “deeply insensitive to Indigenous Canadians, particularly at a time when Indigenous communities are in pain as they unearth more mass graves at the sites of former residential schools.”
“His comments show a fundamental misunderstanding of one of the core tragedies of the residential school system in Canada,” she said. “The children were forcibly separated from their parents.”
Crombie said how Canada’s history has been taught obscures the truth behind what really happened: The federal government and many churches, including the Catholic Church, operated these schools for close to 150 years, committing atrocities and silencing voices forever.
“No apology from the federal government or the church will be enough to undo the havoc that was wreaked through these institutions,” Crombie said. “But an apology is where we must start. It’s a basic and it’s a fundamental foundation to our reconciliation.”
Dr. Suzanne Shoush, who is Indigenous, works for the Catholic-run health network Unity Health Toronto. She is demanding the Pope apologize for the church’s role in residential schools. She said comments like those made by Keenan are damaging to reconciliation and exemplify why Catholic leaders need to intervene.
“This is part of the reason why we keep pushing to have a formal asking of forgiveness to Indigenous people in Canada from the Pope himself,” she said.
“It’s really critical that it comes from the leadership so that we stop having these incredibly ignorant and harmful comments coming from across the church. I think that what we’re seeing is extremely harmful to reconciliation.”
An undated photo of Kamloops residential school students and a priest. (National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation)
Keenan also said in his sermon that while the church should apologize for its participation in the “ill-devised government project,” it should also wait to find out who was buried at the Kamloops site and why before “rendering ultimate judgment.”
During a mass on June 6, Keenan said the discovery was “very sad” and a symbol of the “ongoing tragedy” of government policies against Indigenous people, but also that:
“We don’t know how those children died. We don’t know, we can’t know, if they would’ve died if they stayed at home.”
While he called for prayers and reconciliation, he also said, “Many people had very positive experiences of residential schools. Many people received health care and education and joyful experiences.
“They weren’t universally awful. But there’s still no place for the horrors that are alleged to have occurred there.”
Residential school survivors have shared horrific accounts of abuse, starvation and neglect, and difficulties getting documents from the Catholic Church, which ran the majority of the schools. The final 2015 report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission begins by stating that what took place at residential schools “can be best described as ‘cultural genocide.'”
“The church actively sought to exercise exclusive control over the welfare of these children and therefore are exclusively responsible for the conditions which these children lived in,” Shoush said.
In a statement to CBC News Wednesday, Keenan defended his comments, saying that he was trying to help his congregation struggling with negative news about the church.
“I am deeply sorry, embarrassed, ashamed and shocked at the revelations of abuse, destruction and harm done in residential schools across this country,” he said in the statement. “I in no way condone the system … As a Catholic and a priest, I wish I could say ‘I’m sorry’ to everyone who suffered harm.”
The Archdiocese of Toronto said in a statement it’s been in contact with Keenan “to convey the deep pain and anger” some felt. He has “pledged to fully educate himself” about the history of residential schools.
“We apologize to anyone offended by his remarks,” the archdiocese said.
Pastor criticizes Pride flags at schools
In the same sermon, Keenan criticized Catholic schools for flying Pride flags this month, saying the church had hoped they’d show “courage” by displaying a cross or sacred heart instead. He described the Pride flag as “the standard of contemporary sexual licence” that’s replacing Catholic symbols.
Keenan did not respond to questions from CBC News about his comments toward the LGBTQ community.
Crombie said she told Keenan his comments have no place in the city of Mississauga.
Priest under fire after sermon on the ‘good done’ by Catholic Church on residential schools
Clips of last Sunday’s controversial sermon widely criticized on social media
Samantha Beattie · CBC News · Posted: Jun 24, 2021 5:00 AM ET | Last Updated: June 24
Rev. Owen Keenan, a Roman Catholic priest in Mississauga, Ont., west of Toronto, gives daily mass at the Merciful Redeemer Parish on June 15, 2021. He is under fire for comments about residential schools he made in a recent sermon. (Merciful Redeemer Parish/YouTube)
A Mississauga, Ont., priest is under fire after a sermon referencing the “good done” by the Roman Catholic Church in residential schools, saying some might go so far as to even thank it.
During his sermon at the Merciful Redeemer Parish last Sunday, Monsignor Owen Keenan referenced the Kamloops, B.C., residential school where the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation reported it had discovered the preliminary remains of more than 200 children in unmarked graves in May.
“Two-thirds of the country is blaming the church, which we love, for the tragedies that occurred there,” he said on a video originally posted to the church’s YouTube page but since deleted. Clips of his sermon continue to circulate on social media.
“I presume the same number would thank the church for the good done in those schools, but of course, that question was never asked and we are not allowed to even say that good was done there. I await to see what comes to my inbox.”
‘Extremely harmful to reconciliation’
Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie, a practising Catholic, said she was “extremely disappointed” by her pastor’s comments about residential schools.
Reading from a prepared statement at a news conference Thursday, the mayor called Keenan’s homily “deeply insensitive to Indigenous Canadians, particularly at a time when Indigenous communities are in pain as they unearth more mass graves at the sites of former residential schools.”
“His comments show a fundamental misunderstanding of one of the core tragedies of the residential school system in Canada,” she said. “The children were forcibly separated from their parents.”
Crombie said how Canada’s history has been taught obscures the truth behind what really happened: The federal government and many churches, including the Catholic Church, operated these schools for close to 150 years, committing atrocities and silencing voices forever.
“No apology from the federal government or the church will be enough to undo the havoc that was wreaked through these institutions,” Crombie said. “But an apology is where we must start. It’s a basic and it’s a fundamental foundation to our reconciliation.”
Dr. Suzanne Shoush, who is Indigenous, works for the Catholic-run health network Unity Health Toronto. She is demanding the Pope apologize for the church’s role in residential schools. She said comments like those made by Keenan are damaging to reconciliation and exemplify why Catholic leaders need to intervene.
“This is part of the reason why we keep pushing to have a formal asking of forgiveness to Indigenous people in Canada from the Pope himself,” she said.
“It’s really critical that it comes from the leadership so that we stop having these incredibly ignorant and harmful comments coming from across the church. I think that what we’re seeing is extremely harmful to reconciliation.”
An undated photo of Kamloops residential school students and a priest. (National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation)
Keenan also said in his sermon that while the church should apologize for its participation in the “ill-devised government project,” it should also wait to find out who was buried at the Kamloops site and why before “rendering ultimate judgment.”
During a mass on June 6, Keenan said the discovery was “very sad” and a symbol of the “ongoing tragedy” of government policies against Indigenous people, but also that:
“We don’t know how those children died. We don’t know, we can’t know, if they would’ve died if they stayed at home.”
While he called for prayers and reconciliation, he also said, “Many people had very positive experiences of residential schools. Many people received health care and education and joyful experiences.
“They weren’t universally awful. But there’s still no place for the horrors that are alleged to have occurred there.”
Residential school survivors have shared horrific accounts of abuse, starvation and neglect, and difficulties getting documents from the Catholic Church, which ran the majority of the schools. The final 2015 report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission begins by stating that what took place at residential schools “can be best described as ‘cultural genocide.'”
“The church actively sought to exercise exclusive control over the welfare of these children and therefore are exclusively responsible for the conditions which these children lived in,” Shoush said.
In a statement to CBC News Wednesday, Keenan defended his comments, saying that he was trying to help his congregation struggling with negative news about the church.
“I am deeply sorry, embarrassed, ashamed and shocked at the revelations of abuse, destruction and harm done in residential schools across this country,” he said in the statement. “I in no way condone the system … As a Catholic and a priest, I wish I could say ‘I’m sorry’ to everyone who suffered harm.”
The Archdiocese of Toronto said in a statement it’s been in contact with Keenan “to convey the deep pain and anger” some felt. He has “pledged to fully educate himself” about the history of residential schools.
“We apologize to anyone offended by his remarks,” the archdiocese said.
Pastor criticizes Pride flags at schools
In the same sermon, Keenan criticized Catholic schools for flying Pride flags this month, saying the church had hoped they’d show “courage” by displaying a cross or sacred heart instead. He described the Pride flag as “the standard of contemporary sexual licence” that’s replacing Catholic symbols.
Keenan did not respond to questions from CBC News about his comments toward the LGBTQ community.
Crombie said she told Keenan his comments have no place in the city of Mississauga.
“He expressed his shame and remorse,” she said.
Keith Baybayon says schools help make LGBTQ students feel more included and safe by flying the Pride flag. (Jared Thomas/CBC)
LGBTQ activist Keith Baybayon, who is also a student trustee with the Toronto Catholic District School Board, said members of the Catholic Church have ramped up these kinds of comments as more Ontario school boards agree to fly Pride flags every June. The flag holds a special meaning of inclusion for the LGBTQ community that the cross doesn’t, he said.
“Flying the Pride flag can really express solidarity that the school boards have with their LGBTQ students and staff, ensuring that they belong, their voices are heard,” Baybayon said.
“We’re not taking away the cross. We’re not taking away the sacred heart. They’re all going up there to ensure that every single person is represented in our board.”
oard.”
Support Monsignor Owen Keenan’s right to free speech. Mississauga’s Merciful Redeemer Parish. Email: Pastor@mercifulredeemer.orgAddress: 2775 Erin Centre Blvd, Mississauga, ON L5M 5W2Phone: 1 (905) 812-0030
There are much better explanations for the 200+ deaths at Kamloops Indian Residential School. One very important explanation is that Canada had an alarming Child Mortality Rate.
Another explanation is that the Spanish flu which was rampant in the town of Kamloops had spread to the Kamloops Indian Residential School. According to a news article published last week (Mid June 2021 in “Kamloops This Week”), the Spanish Flu had by 1918 infiltrated the small town of Kamloops (which had about 4,000 people in 1918).
There are much better explanations for the deaths at Indian Residential Schools” (Photo of Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops Above) Over the last two weeks of June, 2021, Canadian radio and television have been going hysterical over the discovery of 200+ bodies of Indian children at Kamloops Indian Residential School. As any sane person can see, the hysteria is completely uninformed. Almost all of the “explanations” given by the hysterical media imply that the children were murdered by Catholic supervisors at the residential school. Where is the evidence for this? There is none. The overwhelming point is that the accusation is blatantly defamatory and that it has already led to the burning down of two Catholic churches in southern B.C. and vandalism of Catholic churches in other locations.
Who are the defamers ? Obviously, it is Canada’s media, particularly the CBC. We offer four much more logical explanations for the deaths: One explanation is that, for a number of reasons, all of Canada had an alarming Child Mortality Rate at the time of residential schools. In other words, non-Indian children died in very high numbers all across Canada. Most of those children are now buried in Christian cemeteries (Catholic and other denominations). If skeptics want to unearth bodies to prove that point, they can go to non-Indian children’s graves all across Canada. There are at least tens of thousands of children’s bodies that could be unearthed. What about going after the churches that the parents and children attended? What about blaming God for all of the deaths? Do hysterical Canadians want to blame the churches that stand beside the non-Indian children’s graves for the children’s deaths? That child mortality rate was very high in the early 1800’s, and remained high into the early 1900’s. Some of those reasons are biological and some are immigration-related.
fact, even in 1915, BEFORE the so-called “Spanish Flu epidemic” began, 27% of the population died in Canada as young children. One can assume, that this number was even higher amongst the Indian population. (See statista.com) A second explanation is that the Spanish flu was entrenched in the town of Kamloops and had almost certainly spread to the Kamloops Indian Residential School. According to a news article published last week (Mid June 2021 in “Kamloops This Week”), the Spanish Flu had by 1918 infiltrated the small town of Kamloops (which had about 4,000 people in 1918).
A third explanation is that Canada’s lazy, biased media, particularly the hysterical pot-headed CBC, has suppressed important facts and created a false “reality” which many Canadians have been deceived and socially pressured into accepting. In fact, many Canadians have been convinced that looking for more believable explanations is wrong. That false reality fits with the CBC and private media’s perverted mission to portray Canada’s 400+ year-history as a time of endless crimes. As any sensible Canadian with experience with COVID 19 would have concluded by now, it probably would have taken only minimal contact between someone from the town of Kamloops and someone from the Indian Residential School to start an explosive outbreak of Spanish flu at the Residential School. The following sentence from a 1918 Kamloops Standard-Sentinel article summarizes the wide effect of the Spanish Flu on the town of Kamloops : “Most homes in Kamloops had at least one case of Spanish Flu and, in some cases, entire families were laid up.” A fourth explanation for the 200+ graves at the Kamloops Indian Residential School is that the 1890 epidemic of Asiatic/Russian flu and later epidemics probably had had similar effects on the town and on the Kamloops Indian Residential School. In other words, the Asiatic/Russian flu had probably killed a significant number of children at the Indian Residential School. It is also quite likely that in all the epidemics, the supervisors at the Indian Residential School were overwhelmed by the epidemics and had to resort to rushed burials to control the spread of the diseases. In fact, a 1918 article that is cited in the “Kamloops This Week” newspaper article of last week supports that idea. That article states that both Municipal and Provincial authorities had been literally “overwhelmed” by the Spanish flu. As hard as it is to believe, in the past few weeks, not one of the media has even mentioned these four very important and much more believable explanations for the 200+ graves at the school.
The overall point we want to make about the reporting on the discovery of 200+ bodies at the Kamloops Indian Residential School, is that Canada’s media are extremely biased, lazy and irresponsible. All are clamouring for an apology from the head of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis. If anyone should be apologizing to Canadians, it should be the loutish Canadian media. After all, Canada’s federal government gave our private media hundreds of millions of Canadian taxpayer money in subsidies in the past two years to keep them afloat. Shouldn’t Canadians expect some sense of responsibility in return? Apparently, the subsidized media don’t think so. Therefore, to re-set its collective brain, it would be appropriate now for Canadians to start a class action suit to recover the hundreds of millions in subsidies.
Let’s be blunt: For its irresponsibility in the past two weeks alone, Canada’s private media and their perverted CBC counterparts, both deserve to be thrown out on the street. As for the CBC, which continues to receive close to $2 Billion per year in subsidies from Canadian taxpayers, it has terminal cultural cancer. In its reporting on the Kamloops incident, it has completely betrayed its founding duty to protect Canada’s majority population. It deserves the utmost contempt of all Canadians. All CBC employees should have long ago had their life-support terminated. In fact, long ago, Ottawa should have converted CBC buildings to manure storage. As a food-generating measure, the manure could have been distributed to urban residents who wanted to fertilize their gardens. CBC staff should have been forced to fill bags with manure. After all, they have been filling the “news” bags with manure for years. In fact, filling bags with manure would be the first productive work that most of these people had ever done in their lives. Also, storing manure in CBC buildings would would have also be a much more useful, appropriate and superior use of the CBC’s building space. As for Canada’s private media, many of them have long created their own financial problems as a result of also betraying the trust of the public. In other words, many Canadians have lost confidence in their reporting and regard them as mere hacks. Like the CBC, they have spent most of their time trying to convert Canada’s population to extremely media-biased views rather than telling the truth. For details on what happened in Kamloops in 1918 when the Spanish flu hit Kamloops, read the following: https://www.kamloopsthisweek.com/news/a-look-at-kamloops-during-the-spanish-flu-of-1918-1.24107151 For other very relevant information which you will not find out from the CBC and other Canadian media, see this material that The Canadian Encyclopedia has published on epidemics in Canada: Epidemics in Canada | The Canadian Encyclopedia “Experts believe that five influenza pandemics have affected Canada since Confederation: 1890, 1918, 1957, 1968 and 2009. “The influenza pandemic commonly known as the Spanish flu developed at the end of the First World War. Its origins are debated. The first outbreaks of the disease occurred in the spring of 1918. The infection traveled back and forth between Europe and North America on the ships carrying troops fighting in the First World War. These troops then introduced the disease into Asia and Africa. The Spanish flu eventually killed about 50 million people worldwide (although estimates range from 20 to 100 million). In Canada, about 50,000 people died, and all parts of the country were affected. The timing of this flu’s development was critical to the eventual success of the virus because there were many people traveling from one part of the world to another. The 1918 flu is widely recognized as the most devastating pandemic in history.
“The name “Spanish flu” emerged as the result of media censorship by the military in Allied countries during the war. These countries suppressed the reporting of the viral infection and death of soldiers. However, in Spain, which was neutral during the First World War, the media widely reported the high incidence of death from the illness. The name of the virus became associated with Spain as a result. “It was not until 1933 that researchers isolated human influenza viruses. This is one of the first steps in the development of a vaccine that can be used to prevent the disease. “Canada was hit hard by the illness, from cities to the most remote communities.
More than 3,000 people died in Montreal alone, while Toronto lost about 1,600 to the disease. More than 8,700 people died in Ontario. There were 4,000 deaths in Alberta and 5,000 in Saskatchewan. Indigenous communities were hit particularly hard. At the time, the Department of Indian Affairs reported 3,700 deaths out of a total population of 106,000. Entire Haida settlements on the western coast of British Columbia were lost to the disease. “Most Canadian communities adopted measures designed to contain the spread of the virus. In Alberta, people were required to wear face masks in public. In Regina, people could be fined for public coughing or sneezing. In Winnipeg, people could be fined 50 dollars for spitting in the streets and all public gatherings were banned. Canada first established the Department of Health in 1919 in response to Spanish flu.”
Senate’s ethics committee recommends Lynn Beyak be suspended without pay
[In Cultural Marxist Canada, in the reptilian grip of an alien ideology, no one, not even a Canadian Senator is safe. In the interest of public debate, allowing many, not just narrowly approved, voices to be heard, Senator Lynn Beyak posted letters critical of Indians she’d received on her website. The Senate Ethics Committee recommends that she be stripped of her pay for the remainder of this Parliamentary session and be sent off to political re-education school on racism. An independent thinker, Senator Beyak was earlier kicked out of the Conservative caucus because she had the temerity to state that the Indian Residential Schools, established to educate native Indians from far flung communities in an effort to take them from the Stone Age to the edge of the modern age in one generation, were not all bad and that many of the staff were caring and dedicated people. Her balanced view was heresy in Ottawa where the demonization of Whites is a moral imperative.
Press reports are too prissy to give us exactly what the offensive letters said. CBC News (March 20, 2019) gave this summary: “Five of the letters contained racist content, suggesting that Indigenous people are lazy, chronic whiners who are milking the residential-school issue to get government handouts.” It sounds like small potatoes. These critical views, right or wrong, are widely held in Northern and Western Canada. Why should they be silenced?]
— Paul Fromm]
The Canadian Press ·
The Senate’s ethics committee is recommending that Sen. Lynn Beyak be suspended without pay for the duration of the current Parliament, over letters about Indigenous people she has posted to her website in March 2019.
The Senate’s ethics committee is recommending that Dryden Sen. Lynn Beyak be suspended without pay for the duration of the current Parliament, over letters about Indigenous people she has posted to her website.
The committee’s recommendations include that Beyak attend educational programs at her own expense related to racism toward Indigenous people in Canada.
The committee’s report also says the Senate administration should be directed to immediately remove five letters from her website if she won’t remove them herself.
The Senate ethics committee was tasked with recommending appropriate remedial measures or sanctions for Beyak based on findings from the Senate’s ethics officer.
The officer reported in March that the Ontario senator posted letters on her Senate website that contained racist content and therefore breached two sections of a code of conduct for senators.
Beyak could not immediately be reached for comment in response to the Senate committee findings.
Back when he was seeking the leadership of the Conservative Party, Andrew Scheer said he’d cut federal funding to any university that did not actively promote and defend free speech on campus. Bully for him! We applauded him, We noted how tyrannical Justin Trudeau is with his caucus. No dissent on abortion is allowed. All elected Liberals must bark the pro-abortion line or be expelled from the caucus or denied a nomination. No wonder Trudeau is such an admirer, like his father before bhim, of Red China,
Sadly, it didn’t take Andrew Scheer long to change his tune. Lynn Beyak is a feisty senator from Northern Ontario. Last year she begged to dissent from the “residential schools were racist hell holes” politically correct line. That’s part of the Indians good, Whites bad, party line where any Indian shortcomings are blamed on White people, colonialism or Jacques Cartier. She pointed out that many of the poorly paid teachers who tried to give Indian youngsters an education were well meaning and did much good. For that, she was roundly denounced and her own party kicked her off the Aboriginal Affairs Committee.
However, Beyak received many letters from Canadians with on-the-ground experience who knew that the Ottawa White guilt narrative was largely nonsense. She did what so seldom happens: She gave Canadians a voice. She published their letters on her website.
Andrew Scheer demanded that she take one of those letters down. She refused. And now she’s out of the caucus.
The National Post (January 4, 2018) picks up the story: “ Sen. Lynn Beyak, who famously declared “some good” came out of Canada’s residential schools, was removed from the Conservative Party caucus after refusing to remove a “racist” comment from her website, Opposition Leader Andrew Scheer said Thursday . Scheer said in a statement that he had learned on Tuesday that Beyak had posted approximately 100 letters from Canadians in support of her position on residential schools to her Parliamentary website. He said the vast majority of letters focused on the history of residential schools, while others contained comments about Indigenous Canadians in general. The Conservative leader said he had asked Beyak to remove one of the letters that suggested Indigenous People want to get things for “no effort” and she refused, resulting in her removal from caucus. ‘Promoting this comment is offensive and unacceptable for a Conservative Parliamentarian. To suggest that Indigenous Canadians are lazy compared to other Canadians, is simply racist,’ he said.” What’s “racist” about that? The only valid question is whether it’s true or not. While there are many hardworking Indians, for whatever reason, anyone with Northern experience knows there are also many Indians with a poor work ethic. The point is: The comment is an OPINION. It’s debatable. It should not be banned..
One reason this country’s political elite of ALL parties is so out of touch with Canadians is there is a whole range of issues that cannot be mentioned. Suggest that the residential schools were an imperfect but well meaning attempt to bring a Stone Age people into the modern work and it’s: “You shut up!” Suggest that there may be something wrong with an immigration policy which will replace, ethnically cleanse, Canada’s European founding/settler people by 2050, if it’s not changed quickly, and again it’s: “You shut up!”
But Scheer was almost a moderate beside the Red Guard vehemence of NDP MP Charlie Angus who wants the Prime Minister to find a way to kick her out of the Senate. In “tolerant” Canada, some views just cannot be tolerated by the virtue signallers of political correctness: “Sen. Lynn Beyak — newly turfed from the Conservative caucus — is fundamentally unfit to represent the Canadian people, NDP MP Charlie Angus said Friday as he urged Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to use his influence to get her removed from the upper chamber once and for all. In a letter to Trudeau following Beyak’s ouster late Thursday, Angus asks the prime minister to reach out to the independent and Liberal members of the Senate, among others, to convince them to ‘use the tools of the Senate’ to finally put an end to what he calls an “egregious abuse of public office.” (CANADIAN PRESS, Januaryy 5, 2018)’ .
So, giving voice to a politically incorrect OPINION is “an egregious abuse of public office” and anti-democratic!
Sen. Lynn Beyak booted from Conservative caucus over ’racist’ post on website
Andrew Scheer said in a statement that he asked Beyak to remove a ‘racist’ letter from her Parliamentary website regarding Indigenous people and she refused
Senator Punished for Defending Residential Schools
So firmly is Ottawa in the hands of the Cultural Marxists of political correctness that even a senator can be punished for deviation from politically correct group think. The all-party line is that the residential schools whereby many Indian students were educated was a case of “cultural genocide” : Indians good; White people evil. Apologies and megabucks in compensation for having been educated are in order.
Along comes Northwest Ontario Senator Lynn Beyak who had the temerity to tell the Senate that many good things happened in these schools and the largely religious staff were self-sacrificing well-meaning people. “I speak partly for the record, but mostly in memory of the kindly and well-intentioned men and women and their descendants — perhaps some of us here in this chamber — whose remarkable works, good deeds and historical tales in the residential schools go unacknowledged for the most part and are overshadowed by negative reports.” (National Post, April 7, 2017) Interestingly, many Indians agree that they were given a start in life and placed on the road to a rewarding career by the education they received in the residential schools, “In particular, she focused on statements made by Cree playwright Tomson Highway, who told the Huffington Post in 2015 that “I have a thriving international career, and it wouldn’t have happened without that school.” (National Post, March 20, 2017)
“Assembly of First Nations National Chief Perry Bellegarde has also called for Beyak to be removed from the committee.” Rona Ambrose, the interim leader of the Conservative Party hopped to the minority demand and promptly stabbed the knife into her fellow Tory and removed her from the Senate Aboriginal Affairs Committee. “‘Ms. Ambrose has been clear that Sen. Beyak’s views do not reflect the Conservative party’s position on residential schools,” said Jake Enwhistle, Ambrose’s spokesman. (Huffington Post, April 7, 2017)
Senator Beyak is not apologizing, nor does she intend to resign for expressing her opinion, as some critics have urged.
Instead she struck back, arguing political correctness is stifling discussion. The Toronto Star (April 6, 2017) reported: “Sen. Lynn Beyak says her removal from the Senate’s committee for indigenous people is ‘a threat to freedom of speech,’ and claims she is supported by a ‘silent majority’ of Canadians. … In a statement Thursday, Beyak bemoaned how it is becoming ‘difficult’ to have a ‘balanced, truthful discussion’ about all issues in Canada. ‘Political correctness is stifling opinion and thoughtful conversation that we must be allowed to have if we are to truly improve our great country,’ the statement said. ‘Too often, on a broad range of issues, a vocal minority cries foul and offence whenever a point of view is raised that does not align with their own.’
The duty of a member of the Senate is to discuss freely the issues of the day. Not so according to an Indian MP, NDPer Romeo Saganash: “Free speech does not apply to ‘people that celebrate genocide,'” he told the National Post (April 7, 2017) Of course, Senator Beyak wasn’t celebrating genocide, just trying to offer some perspective on what has become an Establishment guilt binge.
