“As Minister of Health, I am proud to present Health Canada’s Second Annual Report on Medical Assistance in Dying (2020).”

There will be more … more unmarked graves, more grief, more anger, more shame.

A century ago this month, on June 1, 1921, about 400 women from across Canada gathered at Columbus Hall in Toronto for the first national convention of the Catholic Women’s League. The First World War had ended just two and a half years earlier. Arthur Meighen was prime minister, George V was still on the throne and Canada — 8.7-million strong — was a month away from its 54th birthday.

Racism, Pope Francis said, is “a virus that quickly mutates and, instead of disappearing, goes into hiding, and lurks in waiting.”

“Sorry” is a powerful word, but it is only a start to heal the deep wound inflicted by residential schools.

It came like a punch in the gut. The news of the discovery of the bodies of 215 children on the grounds of the Kamloops Indian Residential School have shaken us to the core. How could this happen in Canada? How could this happen under the roof of an institution run by Catholic religious orders? Despite all the stories of abuse at residential schools, despite the chronicling of horrors in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission report of 2015, despite the history of systemic racism that has victimized Canada’s Indigenous people … this news rips opens wounds that have not even come close to healing.

There is a bit of irony, we suppose, that the year-long fifth anniversary celebrations of Laudato Si’ have come to a close just as the world is in the throes of trying to put “our common home” back in order.

As the story goes, St. Walstan, the patron saint of farmers and farm animals, was foretold of his death in a vision three days before it happened on May 30, 1016. Being a humble, pious man known for his charity, the English farmhand went to confession, then gave final instructions for his burial.

Canada has been riding the fast track on assisted suicide for almost five years, yet it still hasn’t put in place effective protection for health care providers who do not want to play any part in ending a life this way. It’s called conscience rights and it is one of the freedoms specifically mentioned in Canada’s Charter.

From the early days of the pandemic, well over a year ago, it quickly became evident that long-term care homes were in the eye of this hurricane.