Pope’s apology means ‘nothing’ without action: N.S. Indian day school survivor

Violet Paul says the Pope's apology is a step forward but has little meaning without action to right the wrongs that led to decades of suffering for Indigenous people.

The apology from the head of an institution that inflicted years of cultural, emotional and physical abuse upon Indigenous children through residential schools is a step in the right direction, according to some members of the Mi’kmaq Nation.

But a woman who survived an Indian day school, and whose siblings are survivors of the residential school system, says actions speak louder than words.

Violet Paul’s five siblings are survivors of the former Shubenacadie Residential School, opened by the Canadian government and run by the Roman Catholic Church from the 1930s to the late 1960s.

She said that while her siblings are resilient, they still struggle with trauma.

“We can’t get the hurt out of them,” she said. “They cry. They’re grown men and they cry about the hurt that happened to them in there.”

Friday morning in Rome, Pope Francis apologized for the grave and lasting harm caused by the church- and state-sponsored residential school system.

Speaking in Italian, the pontiff said he was “deeply grieved” by the stories of abuse, hardship and discrimination he heard throughout the week from members of Indigenous delegations from around the country.

Paul is a survivor of an Indian day school, another tool of assimilation used against Indigenous children. She said she still bears the scars from her time there – scars largely caused by people who represented the Catholic Church.