Sermon by Rev'd Stephen Kern
17^th March 2010

A Spirituality of Reconciliation
 

On August 6, 1993, then Primate of the Anglican church of Canada Archbishop Michael Peers, at the National Native Convocation, after listening to the stories of many survivors of the residential schools, made a moving apology. Here is part of the text, which is available online:¹

• I accept and I confess before God and you, our failures in the residential schools. We failed you. We failed ourselves. We failed God.
   

• I am sorry, more than I can say, that we were part of a system which took you and your children from home and family.
   

• I am sorry, more than I can say, that we tried to remake you in our image, taking from you your language and the signs of your identity.
   

• I am sorry, more than I can say, that in our schools so many were abused physically, sexually, culturally and emotionally.
   

• On behalf of the Anglican Church of Canada, I present our apology.²
   

This apology was graciously accepted by First Nations Leaders present at the convocation.
 

Fifteen years later in June of 2008, in a remarkable event, Prime Minister Stephen Harper apologized to the first nations communities: "Today, we recognize this policy of assimilation was wrong, has caused great harm, and has no place in our country," said Mr. Harper. "The Government of Canada sincerely apologizes and asks the forgiveness of the aboriginal peoples of this country for failing them so profoundly.
 

"The Government of Canada now recognizes it was wrong to forcibly remove children from their homes … to separate children from rich and vibrant traditions," he said. "We apologize for having done this. ²
 

It is clear that the issues we have been hearing about for the last four weeks are not only a church concern, but also a national issue. Therefore, it is incumbent not only upon us as Anglican Christians, whose church ran some 30 residential school over a 150 year period, ending in 1969, to work at reconciliation; but it is incumbent upon all Canadians to work at reconciliation. In many ways, the church will and has led the way: remember, most of the residential schools were run together with the government, and the church’s apology precedes the important apology of the federal government by 15 years! The church has led the way, but we cannot rest on these laurels by any means. ³
 

³ www.anglicanjournal.com/canada/residential-schools/004/article/historic-apology-to-residential-schools-students-seen-as-a-beginning/?cHash=bcd3b9bda4

The National church has set out on a strategy to make the apology a Living Apology, an apology that goes beyond words to reconciling action. Some of these actions include the work of the PWRDF, and we heard from Dr. Jose Zarate on these issues. Some of the work includes the over 300 grassroots level programs funded and guided by the healing fund, and we heard from Healing Fund coordinator Esther Wesley. Some of the work of the apology will be lived out by the truth and reconciliation commission as Archbishop Terry Finlay told us, and by the Ambassadors of Reconciliation, as we heard from Archdeacon Judith Walton. Furthermore, we are blessed to have relatively newly appointed Indigenous Bishop Mark McDonald who is working nationally to support native ministries.
 

The question remains for us at Trinity, and as individuals, where do we go from here? What can I do on this issue? I am not an archbishop or an archdeacon, or a PhD aboriginal activist or national church worker. What can I do as a regular person? What is God calling us at Trinity to do?
 

I want to couch the question of our mission in the context of a much larger mission, the mission of God (missio dei) the mission of the church, and the mission of each one of its members. Have you ever, after reading the newspaper wondered, "So, what is God up to in the world?" There are many answers to this question as one would expect- for if anyone can multitask, it is our God. But simply put, we can answer with confidence the question, "What is God up to in this world? by saying that, God is working through love and justice to set all things right. God is working with love and justice to set all things right: to bring healing to individuals, communities, nations and all of creation. This is what, simply put, the loaded theological word "reconciliation" means - to set all things right, to bring healing, justice and holiness to fruition in the world. As I was writing this sermon, my 13-year-old daughter Audrey asked me what my sermon was about. As I fumbled for words that she might grasp, we began to talk about her work at school as a conflict resolution peer mediator in her school. In fact, she helps people be reconciled. In conclusion she stated, "So, God’s main job is conflict resolution, and we can participate in that job any way we choose." "Wow," I said, "Brilliant!" That is it in a nutshell. God is at work in the world making all things right, and we are called to participate in the great endeavor in whatever circumstances we find ourselves.
 

The psalm we heard read today (#126) is a hymn of praise to God, who restored the ancient Hebrews to their homeland following a time of captivity.⁴ It is a hymn of joy, of delight in homecoming and restoration that might be lost on us, for so many of us have traveled and moved so often in our lives that we have little sense of "homeland." This was not the case among the ancient Israelites who were deeply rooted in their homeland for over a thousand years by the time this psalm was written. According to the psalmist, it was God who brought them home. God delights in bringing people home, and in seeing their fortunes restored. Would, could, does God delight in seeing the fortunes of Canada’s first Nation’s Peoples restored? I think the answer to that is a resounding yes- but what shape that restoration will take is not yet known. But we do know that the shape of this future will be one shaped not for the indigenous peoples by the dominant culture, but a new future worked out in partnerships of mutual respect and dignity. God is at work in the world, working reconciliation, setting all things right.

⁴  Psalm 126

126:1 When the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dream. 2 Then our mouth was filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy; then it was said among the nations, "The LORD has done great things for them." 3 The LORD has done great things for us, and we rejoiced. 4 Restore our fortunes, O LORD, like the watercourses in the Negeb. 5 May those who sow in tears reap with shouts of joy. 6 Those who go out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, carrying their sheaves.

Setting all things right, doing the work of reconciliation is also the work of Jesus. This is no surprise, for he was the offspring of God. In the Gospel reading, we hear the story of Mary anointing Jesus with costly oil. In this act, at one level, she anticipates his death and begins to prepare his body for death. At another level her act of anointing foreshadows and confirms Jesus’ status as the messiah, the anointed one of God. We recognize Jesus' role as the Messiah, for in our collect today we prayed, "by the death and resurrection of your son Jesus Christ you created humanity anew." In Christ, all things become new, and God’s reconciliation is brought to a wider and deeper reality in the world.
 

The mission of the church is to be this new humanity, set loose in the world to work God’s healing and reconciling love and service, in the power of the Holy Spirit. We are collectively and individually called to be Spirit- empowered, Spirit-led people, passionate about God’s mission in the world to set all things right. We are new creations, as St Paul calls us. We are agents of reconciliation at work in the world, thus God’s mission, our collective mission, and our individual mission are one- the setting aright of all things. Thus, to be a Christian, is to be an agent of reconciliation in every sphere of our lives. This is, what I am calling, a "spirituality of reconciliation." Spirituality is simply, the "lived expression of the faith" on a daily basis. It does seem to me that there are some key aspects of living such spirituality.
 

I believe firstly that we must begin to see ourselves as people with a calling to reconciliation. Hear what St Paul writes in the second letter to the Corinthians: "if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation.⁵
We are given the ministry of reconciliation. Paul goes on further, "So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us". ⁶  We are ambassadors of God, given the task of reconciliation.

⁵  2 Corinthians 5:17,18. See bible.oremus.org.
 

⁶  2 Corinthians 5:20a.
 

To work at this task, it seems to me that we will need to pray for humility and a growing sense of compassion. As an expression of our humility, we cannot assume that though our motives are good, our means are too. Residential schools were, I believe, established with the best of intentions from a 19^th C point of view. The goal was to help equip First Nations peoples to live in a rapidly modernizing Canadian society. Yet, how could anyone really, in the name of Jesus, take young children sometimes unawares, forcibly from their parents and cut them off from their ancient culture? We cannot assume that though are motives are sound, that the means to fulfill them are also sound. This means that to find a way forward in reconciliation, we will need to listen, really listen, and don’t assume you already know what someone is going to say, or what they need.
 

The Women’s Auxiliary of Trinity for many years did send bales of new and used clothing to various mission outposts around the world, some to missions among Canadian Aboriginal communities. Our parish historian John McIntyre in his book on Trinity notes that in the first years of the 20^th Century the WA sent support to St Peter’s Indian Residential School, Hay River in what is now the NWT (Up near Yellowknife). John tells me that it at many meetings women would gather to knit various clothing items to be sent north. It was only years later that they learned that often their painstakingly knitted work was gently pulled apart when it arrived, and the wool used for what the Natives actually could use. This is a true story that connects our parish with residential schools, and that is a powerful metaphor for both our government and our church’s interaction with first nation’s communities. Listen before we leap to help!
 

While we seek to live as agents of reconciliation, we seek to fulfill our baptismal vows to recognize the dignity of all people, of each person.⁷   We strive to use language that preserves the dignity of all people, and so use I statements, and avoid "you" statements that sound like they are blaming statements. It is best to avoid "us" and "them" language. The chair our of social justice committee Linda Adler and I were talking about this, and she said something I think is very profound: "There is no ‘they’, only ‘us’." There is only "us." To use "us" and "them" language is unhelpful for two reasons….it objectifies people and sets them into a different group from one’s own, and furthermore, it assumes that all such people can be lumped together into a single homogeneous group. As we work as agents of reconciliation, we must be aware of your stereotypes, and how you "see" people. I remember one day while teaching in the high eastern arctic complaining to a friend and long-term resident, "These Inuit have NO sense of time!" (Ouch!). He looked at me with steely eyes and said: "The Inuit have an Inuit sense of time." Right. Beware stereotypes.

⁷  Celebrant Will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being?

People I will, with God’s help. Book of Alternative Services, p159.

Furthermore, let us banish guilt. Guild tends to paralyze us more than help us move forward and deal with reality as it is. None of us present here today were alive when the Federal government decided that assimilation was the way to interact with Canada’s Natives. None of us was alive when the Anglican Church decided to actively support this policy. So banish false guilt, and let us work for reconciliation, walking together to an unknown future.
 

Let us also teach ourselves and our children to learn more about the realities of current life for those in native communities. Two weeks ago when I was speaking with the junior youth about our Lenten series, I asked how many had done school projects on Natives. All hands went up, because this is in the curriculum. When I asked how many of those projects included current affairs, only two of twenty hands went up. I held up a children’s book on Native Canadians, and of the whole book, only one page was dedicated to current events. Unfortunately, for many of us, our views of the issues facing First Nations peoples are frozen in history. This hinders us from dealing with the complex issues of today.
 

Our National church is working to make the apology of the primate to Canada’s First Nations peoples a living apology, one that gives birth to actions that work reconciliation. We may not be called to work specifically, as individuals, on this project. But, all of us are called to live out a spirituality of reconciliation in whatever sphere of influence we find ourselves, in our homes, families, at work and at play. I am not yet sure where Trinity is called to go as we move forward, and I do hope that a few will hear the call to work as Ambassadors of Reconciliation. Yet, I am grateful for the start we have made, and look forward to seeing how this series helps us move forward as agents of reconciliation in the world. Amen.