It was a surprising picture: Pope Francis briefly sporting a full Indigenous headdress, its rows of soppy white feathers mounted in place by a colourful, beaded headband after he apologized for the Catholic Church’s position in Canada’s “disastrous” residential faculty system for Indigenous youngsters.
Chief Wilton Littlechild, a residential faculty survivor himself, gave Francis the headdress Monday, putting it on his head amid cheering by an viewers in Maskwacis, Alberta, that included many faculty survivors.
The Vatican and the pope clearly appreciated the gesture: Francis kissed Littlechild’s palms after receiving the headdress, one thing he has executed in the previous as an indication of respect for Holocaust survivors, and has executed on this journey for residential faculty survivors.
The Vatican clearly understood the symbolic significance of the second, placing the photograph on the entrance web page of the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano beneath the headline “I humbly beg forgiveness.”
Headdresses traditionally are a logo of respect, worn by Native American battle chiefs and warriors. For many Plains tribes, for instance, every feather positioned on a headdress has significance and needed to be earned by means of an act of compassion or bravery. Some modern-day Native American leaders have been given battle bonnets in ceremonies accompanied by prayers and songs.
Not everybody was happy by Littlechild’s motion. Some members of Indigenous tribes mentioned they discovered the gesture incongruous with the previous transgressions at church-run colleges that Francis apologized for.
Russ Diabo, a member of the Kahnawake Mohawk tribe in Canada and an Indigenous advocate and coverage analyst, described the scene as “pageantry” and the pope’s statements as “facile.”
Diabo mentioned on Twitter it was “the Catholic Church and Canada collaborating in creating a mythology for a shared ‘Reconciliation’ agenda narrated by prominent federal collaborators/residential school survivors!”
“I have so much to say about this, and all of it negative,” tweeted Joe Horse Capture, vp of native collections and curator of Native American History and Culture on the Autry Museum of the American West in Los Angeles.
“I am practicing ‘If you can’t say anything positive, don’t say anything at all’ mantra. But I’ll be honest, it’s difficult!,” added Horse Capture, a member of the A’aniiih Nation.
Maka Black Elk, government director of Truth and Healing at Red Cloud Indian School in Pine Ridge, South Dakota, described the scene on Twitter as “a #toosoon moment.”
“The discourse around the #PopeFrancis headdress is unfortunate,” wrote Black Elk. “He did not request that. It wasn’t his fault. But it’s also clear the givers did not consider how it would make other Indigenous people feel.”
Black Elk mentioned later in a phone interview that the mixed response to the headdress being positioned on the pope’s head “reflects the reality of native people and our need for more dialogue” concerning the previous.
“I do think that Chief Littlechild felt it was important to honor this moment, and this was a significant moment,” he added.
A spokeswoman for Littlechild didn’t instantly reply Tuesday to a message looking for remark.
But Keeshon Littlechild used a Facebook submit to defend his grandfather for giving Francis one in all his personal many headdresses.
“Bugs me to see people bashing my grandfather and I understand how much respect is needed to be gifted one but at the end of the day that was him showing the pope respect for coming all the way to maskwacis to apologize,” he wrote.
Among these coming to Littlechild’s protection was Phil Fontaine, a former Assembly of First Nations chief and a residential faculty survivor.
“Chief Littlechild followed his protocols,” Fontaine mentioned. “There is a protocol for that kind of gift. He went to the elders, he went to the leadership and requested permission to present that gift. It is entirely consistent with the way they follow their customs and protocol here.”
Jon Crier, a First Nations elder and college survivor, mentioned throughout a information convention after the apology that the gesture meant tribal leaders “adopted him as one of our leaders in the community.
“It’s an honoring of the man, it’s an honoring of the work he has done and it’s also recognizing … here’s a man that belongs in our tribe,” Crier mentioned.
Marie-Anne Day Walker Pelletier, former chief of Okanese First Nation, informed CTV, “I thought it was pretty cool. The chief of all chiefs now I guess.”
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Nicole Winfield and Peter Smith in Maskwacis, Alberta, and Rob Gillies in Toronto contributed reporting. Snow reported from Phoenix.
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