The inaugural Maple Leaf Lecture, delivered by Archbishop Fred Hiltz, Primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, on Monday 5th December 2016, in the Council Room, Kings College London, Strand Campus.
Click here to see the full text of the lecture.
During the first decade of the twenty-first century the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada uncovered the full extent and effect of former government policies designed to ‘eliminate Aboriginal people as distinct peoples and to assimilate them into the Canadian mainstream against their will’. Central to these policies was the establishment of residential schools. The children of indigenous peoples were compulsorily removed from their families in order that they should ‘acquire the habits and modes of thought of white men’. Funded by the Canadian government, the residential schools were managed by Canadian churches, including the Anglican Church of Canada.
Underlying these policies was the so-called ‘Doctrine of Discovery’ which, from the sixteenth to the twentieth century, provided European and North American powers with a ‘legal’ justification for claiming the lands of indigenous peoples. In 2013, following the repudiation of the Doctrine of Discovery by the General Synod of the Anglican Church of Canada in 2010, Archbishop Hiltz set up the Primate’s Commission on Discovery, Reconciliation and Justice. The Commission was tasked with formulating a response to the question ‘What is reconciliation?’ posed by the Chair of Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and formulating the Church’s long term commitment to solidarity with Indigenous Peoples in addressing the long-standing injustices they continue to bear in Canada.
Click here to see the full text of the lecture.