Haida residential school survivor alleges defamation from priest

WARNING: This story contains distressing details.

A Haida elder and residential school survivor is leading a proposed class action lawsuit against the Catholic Church and one of its priests over what she alleges are "false and deeply hurtful" denialist comments.

Sphenia Jones is scheduled to appear in a Calgary courtroom on Monday after filing a statement of claim against Edmonton priest Marcin Mironiuk, the Catholic Archdiocese of Edmonton, and the Oblate Fathers of Assumption Province.

Jones is alleging that remarks Mironiuk made during a mass service in 2021 — in which he reportedly described the evidence of potential unmarked graves at residential schools as "lies" and "manipulation" — are defamatory against herself and other survivors who have spoken out about deaths at the institutions. 

She is proposing a class-action lawsuit, but the defendants from the church are asking that application to be struck down. The court is now set to decide whether it will move forward.

Mironiuk, speaking in Polish, reportedly said during the service that "we are in the presence of lies here in Canada," according to a translation from CBC, and that Indigenous children "were dying from natural causes and were buried in regular cemeteries, and that's why we're living now in a great lie."

Mironiuk also told the congregation he visited the former Kamloops Indian Residential School without disclosing he was a priest and asked to see "mass graves," according to the same translation.

The archdiocese apologized for Mironiuk's remarks, calling the comments "thoroughly unacceptable" and placing the priest on indefinite administrative leave. But Jones said words can't describe the hurt she felt.

"When he said that," Jones said, "that hit me; in the gut, in my heart, so badly. It was like he was directly talking to me."

Jones is from the Haida Nation and survived the former Edmonton Residential School.

If the lawsuit moves ahead, she plans to take a boat and train-ride journey similar to the one she was forced to take more than 60 years ago on her way to residential school. 

"When I was in the residential school, when they used to punish us, they always used to say, 'Nobody is going to believe you,'" said Jones. "I used to say, 'I'm going to tell.'"

A special chambers brief for the case said Jones "brings this claim in defamation, on behalf of herself and the proposed class of residential school survivors who like her have spoken out about deaths at residential schools."

The brief details allegations that Mironiuk's "false and deeply hurtful assertions" have "viciously maligned" these survivors.