Manitoba Metis delegation heads to Rome to meet Pope Francis

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WINNIPEG — A Metis group from Manitoba was flying to Rome on Monday forward of a gathering with Pope Francis on the Vatican later this week.

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The delegation from the Manitoba Metis Federation on Thursday would be the first to satisfy the top of the Roman Catholic Church since he apologized to Indigenous individuals for the deplorable conduct of church members concerned in residential colleges.

The Pope apologized on the Vatican early this month following every week of conferences with Metis, Inuit and First Nations delegates.

The Manitoba Metis Federation had a separate assembly organized with Francis.

Delegates embrace residential college survivors, elders and youth.

David Chartrand, the federation’s president, says many Metis are deeply related to the church.

“Now that His Holiness has issued an apology to all Indigenous peoples, we are able to focus our assembly on the connection between the Purple River Metis and the Catholic Church — previous, current, and future,” Chartrand stated in a information launch Monday.

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Some bishops shall be accompanying the Manitoba Metis delegates to the Vatican.

“It’s the want of all of the Bishops in Canada to maneuver ahead with reconciliation and to construct sturdy relationships with Canada’s Indigenous Peoples,” Richard Gagnon, Archbishop of Winnipeg, stated in a information launch.

An estimated 150,000 Indigenous youngsters had been pressured to attend residential colleges, greater than 60% of which had been run by the Catholic Church.

On April 1, the pontiff stood earlier than a room of practically 200 Indigenous delegates and requested for God’s forgiveness for the actions of the Catholic Church.

“I need to say to you with all my coronary heart: I’m very sorry,” Francis stated in Italian. “And I be a part of my brothers, the Canadian bishops, in asking your pardon.”

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Francis additionally stated he would come to Canada, probably this summer time.

Chartrand stated he’ll request the Pope come to Manitoba to “perceive why we have to renew our relationship, significantly in our small and distant communities, a lot of which the church is a central a part of.”

A Catholic priest performed a big position in Metis chief Louis Riel’s founding of what would turn into Manitoba. Rev. Noel-Joseph Ritchot led the delegation Riel despatched to Ottawa to barter the provisional authorities’s entry into Confederation.

Riel himself was Catholic but additionally wrote about his points with the church.

The Manitoba Metis Federation organized the separate assembly with the Pope after the group withdrew from the Metis Nationwide Council in 2021 following years of inside battle.

The Metis Nationwide Council was a part of the bigger delegation earlier this month.