Editor:
We are all human beings born into this world.
We all have similar needs of food, shelter, and security. We gather into communities to further these needs of food, shelter, and security. Some of us would gather in a building to foster this well-being of being together and supporting each other.
We acknowledge that we all come from the same origin and want to honour that being. We call our building a church, our community in this case is called the Catholic Church.
It is not an institution, but a gathering of people trying to live according to a high level of expectation of love and support of each other. Being who we are, we fail sometimes. Some more than others.
But the community calls us back to seek forgiveness, to offer forgiveness and to seek a way forward in truth. All human beings are called. “Come and see.”
If you investigate the Truth and Reconciliation documents, you will find apologies from all the communities involved. We, as a community, have apologized to those that we wronged. When a sibling hurts a brother or sister, who should apologize, the parent or the sibling that gave offence?
Burying our problems and issues do not make them go away. Even psychologists will tell you that. Pulling down statues, renaming schools, and cancelling Canada Day celebrations will not make things better.
Our cancel culture would have us bury these past actions. Why not add plaques to instruct how things went terribly wrong so that we do not repeat the process in the future.
What about all the immigrants that left their homes from around the world to come to North America. They had to risk black lung disease in the mines, indentured service to the railway builders, purchased lands in the middle of the bald prairie without any warning about the extreme winters.
Having to take high risk jobs as firemen and policemen to feed their families. We even have a segment of our society that was forcefully removed from the Atlantic provinces and relocated to Louisiana. That is just some of our history.
We are Canadians. Embrace it. Shout it out.
Yes, we have made mistakes. But let us not bow down to the cancel culture of today. We have persevered together, and we will continue to persevere as a church community, as a civic community.
We are proud Canadians.
Richard Veronneau,
Canmore
