Intergenerational residential school survivors in Saskatchewan want more after papal apology

While survivors are at the forefront of the papal visit to Canada, intergenerational survivors and Indigenous youth have their thoughts on the apology he offered earlier this week, too. 

Many survivors spoke about the intergenerational impact of residential schools during the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury's visit earlier this year. 

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission's findings also showed the schools left effects even among those who never crossed their thresholds. 

Destiny Thomas, 29, from Pelican Lake First Nation in north-central Saskatchewan, says the grandparents who raised her and her aunts and uncles were taken to residential schools or day schools. 

"Watching [the pope's apology] when it went down, it was very emotional, it had me crying, because these are all of our grandmothers, our grandfathers that were there," she said. 

"Some of them may have needed that apology but I know others — it was almost like opening up that trauma all over again, and it's hard for our people to see that. It's hard for me as a young woman seeing that."

For Thomas, any apology, even from Pope Francis, amounts to "just words," and though they might have resonated with some survivors and Indigenous people across Canada, those words need to come with concrete and meaningful actions.

As a first step, Thomas said, the cycles of emotional, physical, mental and spiritual abuse caused by residential schools need to be addressed in ways that work for each community's specific needs.

"A lot of the addictions that our people go through is because of these residential schools, these churches. It's basically where all of this stems from," she said. "It all comes down to the effects our people [felt] from those churches."

She believes services need to be offered on every reserve and in every urban area to do the work needed to undo the damage caused by residential schools. 

Many reserves, she said, don't have the resources or means to get the help they need to heal and move forward.

As an intergenerational survivor of residential schools, Thomas said she is working to restore the connection she lost with her language. Her grandparents raised her in the Cree language, so she can understand it, but not speak it. 

"I'm still learning my language," she said. "I have a degree in the Cree language literacy … I'm still going for my masters as well in Indigenous language education." 

For Krysta Alexson, who lives in Prince Albert but has ties to Kahkewistahaw First Nation in southern Saskatchewan, the Pope's apology also meant "absolutely nothing."