I… am… Canadian… and sorry

It’s Canada’s birthday, and this year it’s more about reflection than celebration.  I’m proud of the ideal of Canada that I carry around with me. I imagine Canada as an open country, open to different points of views, different ideas, different peoples; a place where you can come from away, make a home, and call yourself a Canadian, but not be forced to give up your other national identity or identities. I know this is not the reality of what Canada is, but this is what I hope Canada can be or strive to be. Seeing the news lately about the Residential School system has been heartbreaking. I couldn’t imagine enduring the heartbreak of having my own daughter forcibly taken away from my wife and I. And yet, this was the reality for generations of families of indigenous peoples here in Canada.

So this year on Canada Day, I can’t really bring myself to celebrate as I did in years past. Nor do I want to cancel the day either. The word Canada is derived from Kanata – a Huron-Iroquois word meaning village. This year I am reflecting on the idea of Canada as a village, as a community. And I want to believe there is space in this community for everyone. Maybe the indigenous peoples in Canada wish for complete autonomy in the national sense, to form their own countries and governments independent of Canada. If that is their desire, the rest of us Canadians should support them in this endeavour. If they can forgive what Canada as a country has done to them and their culture, and wish to be Canadian while retaining their identity, culture, language and customs, then we should support them in this endeavour as well. Personally, I hope that the indigenous peoples of Canada choose the latter rather than the former. Canada, after all, means village.