U.S. church renounces discovery doctrine
Aug 13th, 2009 by David
From the Vancouver Sun:
In a step that could herald a similar declaration by their Anglican cousins in Canada, leaders of the U.S. Episcopal Church have formally renounced the “Doctrine of Discovery” that encouraged John Cabot and other English explorers to seize lands from non-Christian aboriginals in the New World, including this country’s First Nations.
At a U.S. national convention last month in California, Episcopalian delegates highlighted Cabot’s landmark Canadian voyage in 1497 in unanimously adopting a resolution urging Queen Elizabeth — the formal head of the Church of England and the world’s Anglican community — to “disavow and repudiate publicly” the imperial doctrine enacted more than 500 years ago by her regal predecessor, King Henry VII.
Anglican leaders in Canada have also recently expressed shame over the lingering effects — including the residential schools tragedy — of a discovery doctrine driven by cultural blindness and religious zeal.
In his New Year’s address in January, Archbishop Fred Hiltz stated: “Through the doctrine of discovery and the arrogance of our colonialism, we robbed people of their God-given dignity. It is time to make amends.”
The Canadian church’s top official on aboriginal issues, National Indigenous Bishop Mark MacDonald, raised the possibility a formal repudiation of the Doctrine of Discovery when he was appointed to the post in 2007.
Even this week, as church leaders gathered with indigenous Anglicans at a “Sacred Circle” forum in Port Elgin, Ont., Hiltz alluded to the growing momentum among Anglicans to reject the doctrine.
“In recent years,” the archbishop said in his opening homily on Monday, “we’ve seen how the spirit of God has moved people to publicly repudiate doctrines of discovery . . ., to expose the arrogance of colonialism, and the inherent, flawed policies of assimilation, and the acknowledgement of our failures in hurting people in so many residential schools.”
Archdeacon Paul Feheley, Hiltz’s principal secretary, told Canwest News Service on Wednesday that “at the moment, we have no formal resolution” on repudiating the doctrine.
But he said discussions at the Sacred Circle gathering this week could lead to a formal motion at next June’s General Synod, the main national meeting of Canadian Anglicans held every three years.
“The way the Anglican Church of Canada has acted is clearly against the understanding of the Doctrine of Discovery,” Feheley noted. “Clearly the church — for example, in supporting land claims — (has) followed a different doctrine.”
It is much easier to indulge in hand-wringing over past injustices than it is to act with integrity and fairness in the present. Will Archbishop Fred Hiltz stop the attempts his church is making to seize the buildings of Anglican parishes that no longer belong to the ACoC? - that would be a more convincing demonstration that the church has learned its lesson.
When will the ACoC back up its words with actions and deed all its property back to native people? If they have “renounced” the evil doctrine of discovery, must they not now disgorge the fruits of that doctrine? Would we think much of the repentance of a robber if he insisted on retaining the stolen goods?
Here’s the real hypocrisy, in my opinion. The whole, “white man’s burden,” of which this doctrine of discovery was a part, stemmed from a kind of racial and cultural snobbery, where white Europeans considered themselves superior to the “pagan” occupants of the lands and continents they were, “discovering.”
But what do we see now in the Anglican Church, where the feelings and opinions of the occupants of those same lands, and the aboriginal occupants of our own, the vast majority of whom are opposed to the same sex agenda, are ignored and completely discounted by the North American ‘progressives’?
The liberal west is still saying, “We know better than you backward savages.”
Wow! Talk about speaking out of both sides of the mouth.
They just keep digging their hole deeper and deeper. I wonder what it will eventually become?
Dear foolish people, This world was populated based on colonial imperialistic and militaristic behaviour. May I suggest that you give yourself and the world back to it’s creator and stop creating red-herrings that do nothing but advance losseafurs agenda.
As for our Native Peoples interested in politics - find Jesus, you find Love, adopt this and you discover the way to true freedom, Peace and happiness.
It is rather redundant for any organization to start up a band wagon when the horses have left the stable. As my people came over before there were any white women they married natives. The first legislature of Manitoba was populated with Metis including my Grandfather who was the first Minister of Agriculture. I think that by not intergrating the native population into the mainstream of society and by placing them on reserves to live as wards of the state we certainly did them a disservice. Our society does keep changing for instance there isn’t one of my family on the the old family farm as we have moved on, but we’ve tried to keep the natives in a system that doesn’t work. We all definately need Jesus, especially most of our Bishops
In the days of Imperial British Governance we “Canadians” had a pretty clear mindset as to the way things were. In today’s “Enlightened” and Multicultural Canada we see things very differently. We recognize as “injustice” and apologize for things done in an entirely different mindset. At that time this mindset was not wrong nor at the time was it wrong to do what we did to our Japanese citizenry. To apologize without bringing about change is to clearly be operating without sufficient - mindset.
I would argue with that. People who were born in Canada were interned only on the basis of the colour of their skin and who their parents were. How many German Canadians were interned simply because they had German names or German parents? Precious few, because Germans are white. It was racism, pure and simple. If that sort of racism wasn’t wrong in 1933, why did we go to war against Hitler in the first place?
Kate by today’s standards you are quite correct. Actually we declared war to stop German Imperialism. I remember as a boy my Vet father speaking with pride (not racism) of how quickly Canada “rounded up” every “Jap” in Canada - the context at that time was the term was applied to an enemy (mindset) not to a race or citizenry. It may be relevant to note that Germany did not declare war against us, as Japan had. Also I believe there was a considerable time difference between German and Japanize immigration.
It would seem to me that our church leaders should have better things to do than delve into ancient history. The Anglican/Episcopal church is falling apart before our eyes and yet energy is being spent pursuing issues like this that, in the big scheme of things, matter very little to the vast majority of people. Yes, there are many issues which affected our native brothers and sisters that could and should have been handled better. But we can’t change history nor should we feel the need to apologize for or to renounce events that took place over 600 years ago. Instead, the church should be at the forefront of addressing the many lasting injustices so as to promote healing and peace.