In our examination of the issues related to residential schools, we looked last issue at the problems of state power in evangelization. But what about evangelization itself?

A priest friend of mine was recently talking about the current state of affairs as it relates to religious freedom in Canada.

“My body, my choice. No one is going to tell me what to do with my body.”

One of my favourite sights when driving along the increasingly paved landscape of Calgary is an ospreys’ nest that has been built atop the metal girder that supports a ubiquitous piece of highway signage. My children and I have marvelled for many years at the site of this large nest, perched out in the open on unprotected steel, which has supported generations of fledgling hawks. So imagine my disappointment driving past the spot recently only to discover that workers had covered the nest with a wooden pyramid. It is impossible not to personify the forlorn hawk, who sat miserably beside this intervention, appearing lost and confused.

My most recent conversation with an avid COVID-denier came during one of my frequent walks in Edmonton’s North Saskatchewan River Valley. According to my interlocutor, the COVID pandemic is a hoax and a mysterious “they” are hiding data which would show that tens of thousands of people have died from anti-COVID vaccines.

What is the role of the state — the civil power, be it the crown or another form of government — in evangelization?

I love hell. Let me qualify that. Hell is a great motivator, perhaps the greatest motivator. But shouldn’t love be our greatest motivation? Certainly, but hell is a great backup when we’re feeling less than virtuous.

In mid-July, my wife had the opportunity to interview a 92-year-old former opera star at her home in a village between Quebec City and Montreal.

It has been my experience that defence often follows discomfort when reconciliation is needed. In my Catholic faith tradition, the discomfort can be understood as a gift that invites us to turn back, to repent, to make right. And defensiveness is a self-protective strategy to avoid taking responsibility. Defences divert us (for now, or forever) from being in real relationships with the ones we have had conflict with.

There are now a number of Catholic initiatives to raise money for residential school survivors and Indigenous communities. The Catholic bishops of Saskatchewan have launched a fundraising drive and there is a lay-led initiative to do the same. At least two dioceses which never operated residential schools — Calgary and Toronto — have announced that they will be raising funds.