In recent days, several indigenous organizations have demanded an apology from the pope. The remains of 215 Aboriginal children were found at the site of a former boarding school in British Columbia, in the west of the country. The boarding school was run by the Catholic Church in the name of the government.
“We want to apologize,” said Rosanne Casimir, the indigenous leader of the “First Nation” in Sequoiabemec, who announced the discovery last week. “General apologies, not just to us but to everyone.”
When asked why he hasn’t pressured the Catholic Church to make documents about boarding schools public, Trudeau replied that he had already written to the Pope about the matter. “When I went to the Vatican a few years ago, I directly asked Pope Francis to be there so that people could recover and recognize the role the Catholic Church played in this tragedy,” he said in a press release.
But the Pope then refused to apologize personally on behalf of the Canadian Catholic Church. Trudeau said his administration is prepared to take “stronger action,” even legal action, if necessary to force the church to turn over documents requested by victims’ families.
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