Why Pope Francis may be hesitant to rescind the Doctrine of Discovery

WARNING: This story contains distressing details

Pope Francis's apology for the Catholic Church's role in Indigenous residential schools in Canada has raised questions about whether he would formally rescind the church's Doctrine of Discovery.

The doctrine, dating back to the 15th century, included a series of edicts known as papal bulls, that were later used to justify colonizing Indigenous lands.

But any hesitation by the Pope to renounce it may stem from the Vatican's view that the church has already done away with and replaced those edicts, some observers suggest.

"In some sense, from the church's point of view, it doesn't need to be rescinded because it is, in fact, abrogated," said Darren Dias, a theology professor at St. Michael's College in Toronto. "It has no standing."

On May 4, 1493, Pope Alexander VI issued the papal bull known as "Inter Caetera" that provided Portugal and Spain the religious backing to expand their territories in Africa and the Americas for the sake of spreading Christianity. The papal bull said that land not inhabited by Christians could be claimed, while "barbarous nations be overthrown and brought to the faith itself." 

While the doctrine justified the colonization, conversion and enslavement of Indigenous peoples, and the seizure of their lands, scholars say it also laid the foundation for Canada's claim to land and the Indian Act, which laid the groundwork for residential schools.

Dias says other edicts soon replaced the Doctrine of Discovery. For example, by 1537, Pope Paul III had issued his own decree that opposed the enslavement of Indigenous peoples. He wrote that they should "by no means to be deprived of their liberty or the possession of their property, even though they be outside the faith of Jesus Christ."

Despite that, churches kept colonizing and forcibly evangelizing, Dias said.

The Vatican did address the doctrine in a statement to the United Nations Ninth Session of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues in April 2010.

The doctrine, the Vatican argued, had been abrogated as early as 1494 and that "circumstances have changed so much that to attribute any juridical value to such a document seems completely out of place."

The Doctrine of Discovery had also been abrogated by other papal bulls, encyclicals, statements and decrees, it said.

"The bull Inter Caetera is a historic remnant with no juridical, moral or doctrinal value," the statement said.

"The Holy See confirms that Inter Caetera has already been abrogated and considers it without any legal or doctrinal value."