First Nations delegates to call on Pope Francis to revoke church doctrine used to justify colonialism

Members of the Assembly of First Nations (AFN) will urge Pope Francis on Thursday to revoke centuries-old papal decrees used to justify the seizure of Indigenous land in the Americas by colonial powers.

Two papal bulls issued in 1455 and and 1493 gave the church's blessing to explorers' claims to Africa and the Americas.

The Doctrine of Discovery is based largely on those papal bulls, issued by Pope Nicholas V and Pope Alexander VI.

"If you look at our history ... what happened since they landed on our shores, then basically it's genocide," said Gerald Antoine, Dene national chief-elect and AFN regional chief of the Northwest Territories.

"We need to right the wrong."

The AFN delegation — the last Indigenous group from Canada to meet privately with the Pope this week before a final public audience on Friday — plans to call on the Vatican to scrap the doctrine.

The move would fulfil the Roman Catholic Church's role in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's call to action 49, which urges all religious and faith groups to repudiate concepts used to justify European sovereignty over Indigenous lands and people.

The Doctrine of Discovery declared lands held by Indigenous Peoples to be terra nullius — Latin for "nobody's land."

Kaluhyanu;wes Michelle Schenandoah, a member of the Oneida Nation, said the basis for the doctrine was the belief that non-Christian Indigenous Peoples were without souls.

"Because we didn't have souls, that gave the right for these explorers to do whatever they wanted with Indigenous Peoples — murder, rape, enslave," she said.

Schenandoah said the doctrine has shaped the mentality and behaviour of Western culture for centuries.

She also said there's a direct connection between the doctrine and the disappearances and deaths of Indigenous women in Canada.

In many pre-contact Indigenous nations, she said, women had the final say on how the land was used — making them obstacles to European exploration and settlement.

"When you look at how these countries have treated Indigenous women, we are on the bottom rung," Schenandoah said. "Because the doctrine has placed us in this place of being invisible and dispensable, therefore the countries treat us this way.