VIDEO: Michael Matt: Canuck residential schools hoax exposed

In the Great No-longer-white North, the latest sin against political correctness and the progressive agenda is residential school denialism. "Wozzat?" (I hear you ask.) According to the Royal Society of Canada -- a club for the intelligentsia (read: liberal elites) -- it's "a strategy used to manipulate and undermine the realities of Indigenous Peoples' painful experiences under Canadian colonialism to protect the status quo."

Is that woke, or what? But wait, there's more. In the very next sentence, university professors (of course) Daniel Heath Justice [sic] and Sean Carleton go on to say: "An honest accounting of the past makes possible an honourable future — but only if Canadians have the courage to face it."

Source: Truth before reconciliation: 8 ways to identify and confront Residential School denialism. Check it out for yourself but make sure you have a barf bag handy. And take note that this piece of agitprop was published on 25 August 2021.

In the two years since then, the whole residential schools "genocide" hoax has come crashing down, as investigation of the supposed "mass graves" has found not one body... not one set of remains... no evidence to substantiate the claims of the anti-Catholic secular humanists who dominate the Canadian polity. 

Check out this video, featuring Michael Matt, editor of The Remnant newspaper, with clips from an interview with Dr Jordan Peterson.

Click here to see "We're ready for your apology", the complete episode posted yesterday to Remnant TV. And please remember, the liberal agenda is not just anti-Catholic. It's anti-Christian! As Mr Matt says at the end of the clip we've selected, the only was to fight back against the Great Reset is to not comply! Hold the line!

Further reading (told ya so dept.): "Canadian residential schools controversy: the other side of the story", WWW 7/11/21 and viewing: "Francis in Canada - the Pachamama road show", WWW 25/7/22. 

VIDEO: Francis in Canada - the Pachamama road show

Today is the feast of Saint James the Great, also known as Santiago Matamoros, the Patron of Spain. In Spain, the temperature this afternoon was in the vicinity of 40 degrees Celsius, with wildfires making much of the country seem even hotter. In Rome, there were no wildfires, and the temperature rose to only 36. One might suspect that Pope Bergoglio travelled to Canada -- he arrived on Sunday -- to beat the heat. 

But we mustn't impute motive. The given reason for his "pilgrimage" was to apologize yet again for the role of members of the Catholic Church* in co-operating with the government's "policy of colonialization of Canada's indigenous people" by housing and educating their children in residential schools, for a century ending in the 1950s. 

Francis had already grovelled (well, sort of) before a delegation of First Nations and Inuit elders in Rome, four months ago, but that wasn't good enough. Canada's pinko prime minister, Just In Trudeau, pressured the Pope to come in person to engage in a multi-million-dollar publicity stunt against the Church's "abusive, colonialist, and culture-suppressing" missionary activity in Canada. And here he is. 

* It must be noted here that it is dogma that Holy Mother Church, founded by Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, cannot err. If Francis had apologized for mistakes or misdeeds of the Church, that would have been the gravest heresy. That's why the text of his apology, delievered just hours ago, must be read very carefully. Here is the key part of what he said. (The emphasis is mine. Walt)

"I am here because the first step of my penitential pilgrimage among you is that of again asking forgiveness, of telling you once more that I am deeply sorry. Sorry for the ways in which, regrettably, many Christians supported the colonizing mentality of the powers that oppressed the Indigenous Peoples. I am sorry. I ask forgiveness, in particular, for the ways in which many members of the church and of religious communities co-operated, not least through their indifference, in projects of cultural destruction and forced assimilation promoted by the governments of that time, which culminated in the system of residential schools.

"Although Christian charity was not absent, and there were many outstanding instances of devotion and care for children, the overall effects of the policies linked to the residential schools were catastrophic. What our Christian faith tells us is that this was a disastrous error, incompatible with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It is painful to think of how the firm soil of values, language and culture that made up the authentic identity of your peoples was eroded, and that you have continued to pay the price of this. In the face of this deplorable evil, the church kneels before God and implores his forgiveness for the sins of her children. I myself wish to reaffirm this, with shame and unambiguously. I humbly beg forgiveness for the evil committed by so many Christians against the Indigenous Peoples."

Regular readers will know that I hold no brief for the man who calls himself Pope Francis. But his apology, unlike many of the statements which he makes up as he goes along, seems to me well thought through, appropriate and correct.

Other may take a less charitable view. Our old friend Michael Matt, editor of The Remnant newspaper, has just put together a minidocumentary on the residential schools, which he intends as a blow against woke revisionist history, or -- he puts it more bluntyly -- fake news.

Mr Matt calls the Pope's "pentitential pilgrimage" part of the "Pachamama Road Show", another attempt  to exploit indigenous peoples to push a new Woke Order, the success of which depends on a thoroughly discredited Christian Old World Order. Whether or not you think Francis is doing the right thing -- or trying to -- you should watch this video and consider what's really going on here. 

   

Also in this video: What about Francis’s alleged coverups of sexual abusers such as Fr. Julio Cesar Grassi and Bishop Gustavo Oscar Zanchetta? Francis covered for them, and now they're in jail! Who's going to apologize to the victims for Francis's role in those coverups? Mr Matt's Remnant Underground videos are always worth watching... and sharing!

Pope Francis, the Consecration, the apology -- an assessment

In the course of the last two weeks, I have been asked several times what I think, now, about Pope Francis, his March 25th Consecration of Russia and Ukraine to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and his apology, yesterday, to the First Nations, Métis and Inuit peoples of Canada for the abuse of children at residential schools run by the Church.

I confessed, in "Did Francis' consecration of Russia work?" (WWW 28/3/22), that I am unsure what to think about the purported Act of Consecration performed  by the Pope (with a goodly number of bishops joining from their cathedrals around the world), on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception.

Francis' lengthy prayer added a good deal of "progressive" political sentiment to the simple prayer requested by Our Lady of Fatima. At the same time, the words "consecrate", "Russia", and "Immaculate Heaert of Mary" were there. The full video is embedded in our post, so you can watch it and judge for yourself. 

After all, in Francis' words, "Who am I to judge?" Heaven knows. All we mere mortals can do -- those of us who believe in the Message of Fatima -- is to keep praying for the period of peace promised to us by the Blessed Virgin.

With regard to the Papal apology to the indigenous peoples of Canada, I will say first that sight should not be lost of the fact that the residential schools were established by the government of Canada with the aim of providing for the education and upbringing of poor children who were, by the standards of the mid-19th century, uncivilized.

About 70% of the schools were run by various Roman Catholic orders, and it was not only in the Catholic schools that abuses occurred. You can call it "white supremacy" if you like, but the sentiment of the day was that Christian civiliation (read: Western, European civilization) was superior to that of the rest of the world.

We ought not to condemn the residential schools system outright. 1000s of residential school "survivors" got a decent education and health care, and grew up to lead successful and comfortable lives -- some as legislators and judges -- as citizens of Canada. That there were abuses is a fact, but much good was done.

Nevertheless, Francis made a fulsome and apparently sincere apology on behalf of the Roman Catholics who sinned by abusing the children for whom they had the duty of care. He also said that he would visit to apologize in person, and see what could be done to make amends. 

That was all any pope could do. It should be noted that it is dogma that the Church Herself cannot sin. But members of the Church -- human beings, after all -- can sin and do sin. Even the Pope has to go to confession and ask forgiveness of God.

Francis has form when it comes to delivering apologies for wrongs committed by Catholic clerics. In August 0f 2018 he published an open letter to the laity, in which he wrote: With shame and repentance, we acknowledge as an ecclesial community that we were not where we should have been, that we did not act in a timely manner, realizing the magnitude and the gravity of the damage done to so many lives. We showed no care for the little ones; we abandoned them.

But, as politicians in the liberal democracies are learning the hard way, the distemper of our times is such that there will be no end to demands for more apologies, and... wait for it... "reparations". Words, however sincere, are no longer enough. There must be money on the table... lots of it. 

The more apologies are made, the more "victims" come forward, saying that they should be paid thousands, even millions of dollars for wrongs done to their grandparents, great-grandparents, and ancestors back to Adam. 

I do not wish to impute motive to Pope Francis. I give him credit for trying to do good things, according to his conscience. I believe he is sometimes the victim of bad advice from bad people -- inside and outside the Church -- who have bad motives, such as the establishment of the Great Reset / New World Order. And I pray that God's will be done on earth, as it is in Heaven -- with or without Francis.

Further reading: "Memorandum for Next Conclave Calls Francis Pontificate 'A Disaster'", Breitbart News, 18/3/22.  Dr Thomas Williams shares a 2000-word memo being circulated among Catholic cardinals, signed by "Demos" (Greek for "people"), likely (Dr Williams says) a pseudonym for George Cardinal Pell of Australia.

Further viewing: "Bishop Fulton Sheen knew the secret to save Russia", VIDEO, The Kennedy Report, 23/3/22.

VIDEO: Canuck PM promotes "truth and reconciliation"... on holiday!

A couple of years before Canada's sesquicentennial [Look it up. Ed.], the Liberal government of Blackie McBlackface "woke" to the narrative that white Canadians had been beastly to the First Nations -- the Peoples Formerly Known as Indians & Eskimos -- ever since "First Contact". "We" must do something, they told the other Canadian sheeple, to make amends for hundreds of years of racism and genocide!

Just before M Trudeau got elected in October of 2015, a Truth and Reconciliation Commission set up by the previous racist government of Steven Harpoon released an executive summary of its findings along with 94 "calls to action" regarding reconciliation Indigenous peoples and "old stock Canadians". Mr Socks promised to take all this very seriously and swore that this time, Something Would Be Done.

That December, he TRC concluded its work with the publication of a multi-volume final report that concluded that Canada's system of "Indian residential schools", in particular, amounted to cultural genocide. Not much notice was taken until this spring, when the remains of 215 children were uncovered in unmarked burial sites on the site of the Kamloops (BC) Indian Residential School. The SJWs and woke media leapt concluded that the residential schools were guilty of not just "cultural genocide" but physical genocide!

With the prospect of another election looming, Canada's chief virtue-signaller sprang into action, ordering the maple leaf flags flown on all government buildings to be lowered to half-staff**. Every woke organization, whether in the public or private sector followed suit, so today you rarely see a Canadian flag flying from the top of the pole. And now that the election is over, M Trudeau says the flags will remain lowered until the Indigenous leaders say it's OK to raise them again.

But wait (as Vince Offer used to say), there's more! Just before calling the election held just finished, Emperor Trudeau II decreed that September 30th would henceforth be a holiday -- National Truth and Reconciliation Day -- to be observed by the federal government and all its agencies (like Canada Post and the CBC) and all federally-regulated organizations, including many large private-sector institutions, such as banks.

Canadians were ordered not to treat the day as a time to relax and enjoy some time off, but as an occasion for remembrance, reflection and (of course) repentance for all the wrongs done to Indigenous peoples over the years. Such as paved roads, electric power, literacy -- the list goes on. Ceremonies, including the now-obligatory land acknowledgment ceremony, were held at city halls, residential school sites and other appropriate places across the land.

Progressive politicians of all stripes performed the ritual grovel, looking solemn and promising to do more for the First Nations. That was understood by all to mean even bigger cash handouts, since it is well known that nothing assuages hurt feelings better than "reparations". 

Somewhere around mid-day yesterday, Global TV noticed that M Trudeau had not been seen since his appearance at a ceremony in Ottawa the previous night. Where was he? His daily itinerary initially stated he was in "private meetings" in Ottawa, but was later updated to note he was actually in, errr, the resort town of Tofino BC, "spending time with family for a few days."

Not to worry though, a spokesthingy told CBC News (which ran the story, with comments closed, only this morning). "Following his participation in last night's ceremony marking the first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, he is speaking today with residential school survivors from across the country." Speaking. On the phone. Not face to face.

Lynne Groulx, CEO of the Native Women's Association of Canada, told CBC News that it was "quite upsetting" that the prime minister would travel on this specific day. "This is a government that has said Indigenous people are [the] most important priority for the government and that action … does not match the words," she said. "So that's very inappropriate, in my view, for the prime minister." Trudeau, she said, should be "the one who is leading this reconciliation process." 

Walt is reminded of one of the funniest bits ever done on Seinfeld. In these scenes, Jerry -- no racist he! -- tries to convince Elaine's Native American friend that he really doesn't recognize any difference between Native Americans and other Americans.

   

M Trudeau used to be a drama teacher, or so his rather thin résumé said when he first ran for election. Wonder if he coached Jerry for this performance.

** FOOTNOTE: You will often see and hear "journalists" refer to the lowering of flags to half the height of the pole as "lowering them to half-mast". That term is only correct when the "pole" is the mast of a ship. When it's a flagpole on land or a building, the correct term is "half-staff". And while we're at it, the correct protocol for this action is to raise the flag to the top of the staff first, then lower it to half-way down.

VIDEOS: Canucks explain why they celebrate Canada Day

Every year, about this time, Walt, Poor Len [and Ed.! Ed.] extend best wishes to the 1000s of Canucks who read WWW, for a Happy Canada Day! Occasionally... sometime later... we get a comment from a puzzled American reader along the lines of "Huh!? What was that all about? Huh?!" 

This year we're going to pre-empt such expressions of ignorance by posting a nice little video from Brittlestar, the Internet's favourite dad* (*unproven), in which a Canadian explains to his American neighbour exactly what it's all aboot.

So now you know... But this year there are a couple of distractions. First is the fact that, for the first time in history, Canada's team -- the Montréal Canadiens -- are questing, in the heat of summer, to bring the Stanley Cup back to Canada for the first time in 28 years. That's why we're putting up this post a bit early. Go Habs go!

Then there's the controversy over the finding of 100s of unmarked graves of Indigenous children at since-closed residential schools in Canada's western provinces. In displays of virtue-signalling rare even for Canada, SJWs and the loonie left have torn down statues, petitioned to have the names of old lwhite guys removed from schools and other buildings, and even called for Canada Day to be cancelled. Prime Minister Blackie McBlackface has preached that Canada Day 2021 should be not a day of celebration, but of reflection. Hair shirts to be worn and Maple Leaf flags flown upside-down. 

Walt urges Canadians -- and the foreigners, particularly the Chinese, who have been quick to condemn Canada -- to get a grip, and remember all the good things that have been done by the "evil white colonialists" which have benefited Indigenous people, white people, and, yes, the millions of BIPOCs who have come to Canada in spite of the "systemic racism" and are queuing even as we write to bring still more of their kith and kin to this "bastion of white supremacy".

It's a rare country -- I defy you to name even one -- that doesn't have some shameful acts and episodes in its history. Even Americans, the most patriotic people on earth (except for those who hate the USA and everything it stands for) should know that. I don't know -- and don't care to know -- any Canadians who don't think that Canada, for all its faults, is still the best country on earth. Like this guy...

Canadian residential school deaths: a calm look at the facts

Ed. here. At the risk of sounding like a Canadian, I'm going to start with a disclaimer (and apology, of sorts). Canadians have been agonizing for decades now about what to call the indigenous people who have inhabited the Great White North for 1000s of years. Names like "Indians" and "Eskimos" are no longer politically correct. 

In fact, the football team formerly known as the Edmonton Eskimos announced just a few days ao that it will now be called the "Elks". The people known as Eskimos would prefer to be called Inuit, so that's easy. But the people we called "Indians", wishing to avoid the stigma of being taken for south Asians [??? Ed.], can't decide if they want to be called "First Nations" or "Dene" or "Aboriginal" or "Indigenous" or just "the people". So in this article, I'm going to stick with "Indians" because this is about what were called "Indian residential schools". 

Last week, the remains of 215 children were uncovered in unmarked burial sites on the site of the Kamloops (BC) Indian Residential School. The school was established in 1890 and from 1892 run by a Roman Catholic order of religious, the Oblates of Mary Immaculate. It was once the largest residential school in Canada, with its enrolment peaking at 500 in the 1950s. 

It was in operation until 1969, when it was taken over by the federal government to be used as a day school residence. It closed in 1978. The school building still stands today, and is located on the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation. 

It should be noted that the first such residential school had opened almost 60 years earlier, in Brantford ON. A handful of schools run by mostly Protestant missionary groups had been established even before that. In 1847, Egerton Ryerson, superintendent of schools in Upper Canada (today's Ontario), wrote a report recommending the establishment of residential schools for Aboriginal students in the province. Methodist missionaries established a number of such schools in southern Ontario in the 1850s. Other schools were opened in British Columbia and the Northwest Territories in the 1860s.

Following Confederation, the Canadian government became more involved in residential schools, but since education was left to the provinces under the Constitution, the federal government left the operation of such schools to various churches. About 70% of them were run by Roman Catholic orders, with the remainder being looked after by Protestants. 

According to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC), a body set up in 2015 to investigate these schools, they were boarding schools for Indigenous children, that didn’t exist just to teach them school subjects, but "primarily to break their link to their culture and identity."

Sir John A. Macdonald, the anti-French, anti-Catholic, racist drunk who became Canada's first prime minister, had this to say. "When the school is on the reserve, the child lives with its parents, who are savages; he is surrounded by savages, and though he may learn to read and write his habits, and training and mode of thought are Indian. He is simply a savage who can read and write. 

"It has been strongly pressed on myself, as the head of the Department, that Indian children should be withdrawn as much as possible from the parental influence, and the only way to do that would be to put them in central training industrial schools where they will acquire the habits and modes of thought of white men."

In other words, the aim of Sir John Eh was to turn Indian kids into "apples" -- red on the outside and white on the inside.  

According to TRC reports, at least 150,000 Indian, Inuit and Métis children passed through the residential school system. They were separated from their families, forbidden from speaking their own language or engaging in their cultural practices. In addition to attending class, students at many schools had to perform chores to maintain the school and even sometimes do farm work to feed the school.

Many were mistreated and abused, physically and sexually. Students were often malnourished or underfed, and lived in poor housing conditions that threatened their safety. Infectious diseases like tuberculosis and influenza often ran rampant among the students, leading to many deaths. 

The TRC identified 3,200 deaths as part of its investigation. They note that indigenous children in residential schools died at far higher rates than other Canadian children, even for the time. Many children died from infectious diseases (notably tuberculosis), fires in school buildings, suicide, drowning, and other accidents.

All too often, the schools and/or government failed to record students' names, gender, or even the cause of death. The deaths themselves were often unrecorded. Some students got sick and were sent home, where they later died. Métis students whose attendance at school wasn't funded by the federal government but who may have died there were not counted.

In its report, the TRC lamented that "due to the limitations in the records, it is probable that there are many student deaths that have not been recorded in the register because the record of the death has not yet been located. Most of these children died far from home, and often without their families being adequately informed of the circumstances of death or the place of burial."

Children who died at school were likely buried at the school, or in nearby municipal or church cemeteries. Some of these locations are known and the cemeteries still maintained, but some are not. As the TRC wrote, "For the most part, the cemeteries that the Commission documented are abandoned, disused, and vulnerable to accidental disturbance."

Such as the case at the Kamloops Indian Residential School. People had known and spoken for years about the existence of a graveyard, but until this year no-one had looked for it. Disturbing though it is, the discovery of the site is disturbing, but not unique. Nor is it evidence of an unspeakable atrocity. It is not one mass grave, but a hiterto undiscovered burial site. That's all.

For that reason, it is unhelpful for the usual gang of virtue-signalling politicians, SJWs and members of the human rights industry to use words like "genocide", and demand apologies -- not to mention "reparations" -- from the Roman Catholic Church and its supposed pope, as if they bear sole responsibility for acts and omissions of decades ago.

The Most Rev. Thomas Collins, Cardinal Archbishop of Toronto, expressed his sorrow in a statement released on June 3rd. Yesterday he told the CBC's Rosie Barton [naturally. Ed.] that the archived records of the OMI had always been available, so it was "unhelpful" for the Prime Minister of Canuckistan (who supports abortion but claims to be a Catholic) to threaten to take the Church to court to obtain production of those documents. 

In response, Carolyn Bennett, who carries Mr Socks's bags on "Crown-Indigenous Relations", told Cacklin' Rosie that it was "unhelpful for Cardinal Collins to call Mr Trudeau's statement 'unhelpful'." Expect more such name-calling, finger-pointing, virtue-signalling and scape-goating in the weeks to come. It's the Canadian way.

Footnote: Yesterday, a mob of iconoclasts ["mostly preaceful protesters", shurely! Ed.] succeeded in pulling down the statue of Egerton Ryerson which stood in front of the Toronto university named after him. It is rumoured that there may have been one or two Indians in the mob. 

A few days earlier, the city council of Charlottetown PEI caved to the pressure and removed the statue pictured in "What's wrong with this picture?", WWW 11/5/21. When it comes to promoting "truth and reconciliation", such actions seem to me "unhelpful"!

"Anti-racist" reign of terror spreads from Confederate to Catholic statues

The violent alt-left extremism that is now sweeping the Excited States of America, as seen in Charlottesville VA and many other cities, has now extended its terror in another direction. First it was the desecration and destruction of historic statuary and monuments. Now it's religious (read: Catholic) statues that are under attack.

The first victim in this latest fit of iconoclasm was the statue of Fra Junipero Serra at a park across the street from Mission San Fernando, in California. Brother Juniper was a Franciscan missionary who brought the Catholic Faith to the Spaniards and Indians in Alta California. He was beatified by Pope John Paul II on 25 September 1988, and canonised on 23 September 2015, at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington DC, during JP II's first visit to the United States. Because of the Saint's recorded acts of piety combined with his missionary efforts, he was granted the posthumous title "Apostle of California".

Now the barbarians of the left, acting in the name of "indigenous rights", have spray-painted a statue of Saint Serra, covering the face, chest, and hands in red paint. The word "murder" is written in white down the front. An Indian (or Native American -- whatever's PC) boy standing with him as part of the statue has red painted under his eyes and down his front as though he were crying blood. The obligatory swastika, standing for everything the anti-Western, anti-Christian hates -- has also painted on the boy.

Thus the frenzy of destruction of statues honouring heroes of the Confederacy is extended to all statues, paintings, photographs and other reminders of people and events that make liberals, secular humanists and revisionists feel uncomfortable. But really... Fra Junipero Serra is a Catholic Saint, and his statue is a religious icon! There is talk, now, of moving the statue to a museum where it can be "protected" (read: forgotten about), but the damage has been done.

The problem is not so much the removal of a statue to a museum, but rather the question of where the revisionism ends. As President Trump has said, if statues of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson are torn down because they were slave-owners, why not also destroy statues of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson? After the statues, what next? The names of buildings, streets, cities and perhaps even states? (It's already happened in Canada's capital, where the name of Hector Langevin has been taken off the government building which houses the Prime Minister's office, because M Langevin dared to suggest that Indian kids might be better educated in residential schools.) Perhaps Washington DC and Washington state could be renamed to honour... let's see... how about Al Sharpton?

Why stop there? How about reprinting American currency to avoid any association with slavery... or Freemasonry? How about rewriting, or even discarding the Constitution because many of its authors were slaveholders? History is filled with unpleasantness, just like the present. It is important to acknowledge the sins of the past, but it is also important to recognize that some of the same people also contributed great things to the world. Shall we talk only about the sins -- real and imagined -- of these people, or simply write them out of history entirely? Shall we just deface, or totally destroy all things we don't like?

It seems that the world is sinking into a chaos of barbarism like that which followed the Fall of Rome. It was that chaos that led St. Benedict of Nursia to gather books and religious articles into his monastery at Monte Cassino, there to preserve Western culture until the Dark Ages ended. What will it take to make America -- or the blue half of it, at least -- come to its senses? And until it does, who will preserve and protect the physical evidence of what went before?

WORTH WATCHING: Dr. Steve Hurley talks about Confederate statues and cultural Marxism. Just posted on YouTube today. Find out what's really behind the mania.