NO TRUTH, NO RECONCILIATION! The next residential schools chapter: No truth, no reconciliation JIM MILLER CANADA RESEARCH CHAIR IN NATIVE-NEWCOMER RELATIONS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF SASKATCHEWAN JUNE 27, 2008 AT 8:00 AM EDT The hopes of many Canadians are riding on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that began operations on June 1. The three commissioners - Mr. Justice Harry LaForme of the Ontario Court of Appeal, lawyer Jane Brewin Morley and health-care specialist Claudette Dumont-Smith - and their staff have been allocated $60-million to accomplish a series of ambitious tasks over the next five years: acknowledge the residential school experiences and their impact, provide an appropriate place for former students to tell their stories, "promote awareness and public education of Canadians" about the schools, "and create as complete a historical record as possible" of the residential schools system. If these goals are to be achieved, it is important that several key considerations be taken into account. First and foremost, it is critical that the truth commission recognize that the residential schools story is one that involves many parties. Not only are members of the three aboriginal communities central to residential schooling history, but also people from the Christian community whose churches actually operated the schools, and the Canadian public, in whose name governmental people, both from the political and bureaucratic areas, acted. The residential schools story had three actors, and it is vital that people from all three of those sectors make their voices heard. Why is it essential that all three actors from the past be involved as the commission carries out its work? Well, it will be impossible to assemble "as complete a historical record as possible" if one or more of the agents are excluded or choose not to participate. Former students who have positive, or partially favourable, memories of the schools need to have their stories heard. They have not been to this point. Former church workers in the schools also have recollections of the residential schools experience. Reconciliation will be impossible without the participation of church members and representatives of the public, along with native students in the schools. The aboriginal community cannot bring about reconciliation by itself. All of us must be engaged if reconciliation is to be reached. http://tinyurl.com/5cgcxt CBC: Stolen Children Origins of racism http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/truth-reconciliation/audio/Pauls_TW_June_8.mp3 Hidden Graves http://www.cbc.ca/video/popup.html?http://www.cbc.ca/mrl3/8752/news/features/hunt-1st-graveyard080609.wmv