Photo credit: The Globe and Mail
“The truth has to be shared and told to the Canadian people,” said residential school survivor Michael Cheena at the ninth annual Indigenous Legacy Gathering on Wednesday.
Toronto Today reports that several hundred people – many wearing orange shirts – gathered in Nathan Phillips Square to commemorate the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, observed annually on Sept. 30.
Organized by Toronto Council Fire Native Cultural Centre, the public event outside Toronto City Hall honoured survivors, their families and those who never returned home.
“The government-funded church and church schools attempted to kill the indian in the child,” Cheena, who attended residential schools for eight years, told Toronto Today. “The truth has to come first before reconciliation.”
For over 150 years, more than 150,000 children attended residential schools across Canada, with the last one closing in the late 1990s. Thousands of students who were taken from their families suffered physical and sexual abuse.
The National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation in 2021 documented over 4,000 deaths of First Nations, Inuit and Metis children in residential schools across Canada.
Cheena said he had used alcohol to cope with his experience in residential schools, adding that he “didn’t know the consequences of untreated alcoholism.”
He has now been sober for over 35 years and works as an advocate for residential school survivors and a facilitator for Circles for Reconciliation, a grassroots non-profit that establishes meaningful relationships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples.
At the square, several tents and tipis were set up, and a large dreamcatcher was suspended from the roof of the stage. A survivors’ flag was flown at half-mast at City Hall.
Numerous speakers took the stage to address the crowd, including Suzanne Shoush, the board president of Toronto Council Fire.
She told Toronto Today after her speech that it was “incredible” to witness the land reclaimed.
She also took notice of the number of children present. Crowds of children were there on school trips or with their families, getting the opportunity to visit tipis or try out lacrosse for the first time.
She said she loved that children were in an atmosphere of celebration and remembrance.
Mayor Olivia Chow also took the stage on Wednesday.
She told the crowd of hundreds that while the gathering commemorates survivors and the continued pain surrounding residential schools, the day also shows “so much power.”
