Author:
Publication: Episcopal News Service
Date: May 8, 2001
(ENS) The bishops of the Anglican
Church of Canada have warned the prime minister that, unless he gets involved,
the church will soon be bankrupt because of a rash of lawsuits brought
by victims of abuse at church-run residential schools for indigenous youth.
In a May 4 statement from the House
of Bishops, read from pulpits throughout the church, the bishops said that
they are "greatly disturbed by the inability of the federal government
to come to agreement with the churches which were involved in the operation
of Indian Residential Schools."
The church has told the government
that its assets will be exhausted before the end of the year. "We as leaders
of the church remain committed to the pursuit of justice for those whose
lives have been damaged by abuse at the schools," the statement said. "We
remain committed to the ministry of healing among the indigenous peoples
of Canada; however, if the continuing aggression of the Department of Justice
forces our General Synod into bankruptcy, this and many other ministries
will be disrupted."
In a letter to Prime Minister Jean
Chretien, the bishops said that "those who were abused still wait for justice
and the litigation is rapidly draining the resources of several of our
dioceses and of our national body.... We are perilously close to bankruptcy."
A letter from Archbishop Michael
Peers, primate of the church, to Chretien was equally blunt, pointing out
that the church was living with "a sense of expectation, born of our discussions
with the Deputy Prime Minister, and on the other hand a steadily mounting
sense of frustration, born of the lack of any tangible progress toward
a just resolution of the residential schools legacy."
Peers said that 99 percent of the
church's funds have been spent on litigation, only one percent on settlements.
He said that the bishops were convinced that "justice is not now being
served--and we cannot see how continuing this pattern will ever serve the
purposes of justice."
More than 7,000 people have brought
legal action against the federal government and churches, which operated
the schools. So far the government has ignored suggestions from indigenous,
legal and church groups seeking a way to settle the claims outside the
courts.
