Ceremonies, celebrations and calls to action mark first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation

Ceremonies, celebrations and a march through downtown Montreal will mark the first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation - commonly called Orange Shirt Day - which honours victims and survivors of Canada's residential schools program.

Sept. 30 is the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation- commonly called Orange Shirt Day - and Kahnawake's ceremony is one of many that will take place across Canada to honour the victims and survivors of the country's residential school program that ran for over a century and forcibly removed Indigenous children from their families and communities and sent them to boarding schools.

Kahnawake's tobacco ceremony will be followed by a birthday party for all those special days children missed while at the institutions.

"It's a day of positive actions and positive reactions," said organizer Helen Jarvis Montour, whose father attended residential school in Spanish, Ontario.

In Kahnawake's sister Kanien'kehá:ka community Kanesatake, the community will meet at the local school before walking to the local cemetery where a monument to residential school survivors and victims stands.