The setting is ironic. A chilly dawn in the heart of an awakening Montreal; the uncaring morning rush flooding past Place du Canada. On the unkempt grass and cracked, patched pathways on what was—is, some insist—Mohawk territory, 300 people surround a praying aboriginal elder. This is the Sacred Fire Ceremony launching the fifth national event of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
The elders, singers and drummers salute the four directions as the sun’s first rays flash above Mary Queen of the World Cathedral, fall upon St. George’s Anglican Church and the sleek CIBC tower to the west. Northward, the stately Sun Life Building appears unamused.
The Sacred Fire flickers and smolders a few feet behind the statue of John A. Macdonald, who is staring unperturbed at that young whippersnapper, Wilfred Laurier. A hundred yards further, the scent of burning sweet grass reaches a statue of Robbie Burns, whose words engraved on the pedestal capture a spirit with which the elders would surely agree:
“It’s comin’ yet for a’ that,
That Man to Man, the world o’er,
Shall brothers be for a’ that.”
The four late-April days in the nearby Queen Elizabeth Hotel—another irony noted by one residential school survivor in her statement—followed the familiar format of past TRC events, filled with laughter, music, many tears, some rage and countless expressions of hope for new relationships in a Canada recovering from the dark legacy of residential schools. There were both intimate and public moments of grace in which the Holy Spirit, the spirit of the Creator, seemed very present. The 12,000 who attended, and more than 5,000 in 30 countries who followed via live stream on the internet, were left to ponder the way to reconciliation.
