Shame Not the Answer

Re For the Record, September

First, let me state that I agree with the fact that what happened to the thousands of residential school students was reprehensible and horrible. I do not however, agree with your thesis that “[W]e need to feel shame …” for those horrible events. Speaking as a retired psychologist, I have counselled hundreds of individuals with various types of mental health disorders, many of which can be attributed to deep, corrosive shame. In my opinion, shame is not an emotion that promotes or facilitates true reconciliation and positive change. Shame is not a feeling that one has done something wrong. Rather, it is the feeling that one is wrong, inherently and irreparably defective.

I do agree with the notion you advance that “we need to come to our aboriginal brothers and sisters with the same vulnerability we come before God, asking for forgiveness and then asking what can we do now.”

I believe that if we reflect in prayer on these horrors we are likely to feel a profound and complex sense of sadness, remorse, regret and contrition.