Truth and Reconciliation

I was moved to tears and was humbled and deeply moved by the testimony I heard last week from former residential school survivors.

This event in Winnipeg was the official opening of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. This was first national event out of 7 that will be held across Canada. During a Commissioner's sharing circle in the afternoon, survivors opened their torn hearts and souls, telling their stories of abuse and deep everlasting pain to a crowd of hundreds who stood under a blazing sun.

No one was spared the emotion of the day especially by testimonies that talked of the sexual, emotional and physicall abuse as well as by the testimony of a woman who pleaded for help in finding the remains of her grandfather, who had killed himself to ease the pain of his residential school memories, and whose suicide was considered such a crime by the church he was buried without a coffin in an unmarked grave.

I will return to the sharing circle's in different parts of Canada over the next 2 years. We must all hear these stories if we are to heal and reconcile the past and move forward.

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