Pope Francis To Meet Residential School Survivors

Pope Francis will meet with Canada´s residential school system survivors, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB) announced on Wednesday. This, after another First Nation group, found today 182 human remains at St Eugene’s Mission residential school, in British Columbia, the third site revealed in a month.

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The Catholic authorities said the visit would occur between December 17 and 20 as demands of a papal apology grow. "It will have a greater sense of power and truth to his feelings and his pathway to healing if he comes into the soils of Canada and stands here on our lands," Manitoba Metis Federation President David Chartrand said, referring to the Pope.

The Pope has repeatedly been asked,  since 2015, to apologize for the 120 years Residential School System led by the Catholic Church that separated thousands of Indigenous families and is considered a cultural genocide in Canada.

However, following the announcement Assembly of First Nations National Chief Perry Bellegarde said that "there are no guarantees of any kind of apology, but we have to attempt, and we have to seize the opportunity, and I believe the spirit will move, and I think things will happen in a good way. That's my belief, and that's my hope, and that's my prayer."