"A time of renewal for First Nations people": a conversation with Bishop Mark MacDonald

Since his appointment as the inaugural National Indigenous Anglican Bishop in January 2007, Bishop Mark MacDonald has served as pastor and spiritual leader for Indigenous peoples across Canada. CPJ’s Karen Diepeveen spoke with him in February 2008 about moving towards reconciliation and justice for Indigenous peoples.

CPJ: Your position is relatively new, established within the last year. Why was it created?

Bishop MacDonald: The Anglican Council of Indigenous Peoples worked on it for a couple of decades, so here was a lot of preparation for it. At a sacred circle gathering of Anglican Indigenous people in Pinawa, Manitoba in 2005, they requested that the Primate of the Anglican Church of Canada assist them in getting Indigenous bishops to help lead them in a self-determining church. The Primate said that he would be able to get them a National Indigenous Anglican Bishop who would help to further the process.

What do you mean by self-determining church?

Well, it’s going to mean different things in different communities and locations. The people of the land, Indigenous people of North America, have a certain authority and a certain identity of their own and they’ve never– by the church not to mention the government – had the possibility of being self-determining. Now with the church, it’s been odd that the church has often insisted that the government allow First Nations to be self-determining but then hasn’t even noticed that it needs to too!

Self-determining has to be worked out tribe by tribe, community by community, church by church. Self-determining really means that people get to choose how they live out their Aboriginal identity and how they structure their Anglican life. And it will probably mean very different things for very different people. For some it may mean, “We do things exactly the way we used to,” and for others quite clearly it’s going to mean, “We’re going to make a fairly substantial difference in the way that our life is structured.”

And so how did you exactly come to the position and get involved in this ministry?

Well, although I’m from the US, I’ve been involved with Indigenous people and their work here for quite a number of years. I had participated in a number of the presentations that the Anglican Council of Indigenous Peoples had made to the General Synod, and also, I’d been a participant in sacred circles and other Indigenous events. And the way that the Primate had set it out was that he had to appoint someone who was already a bishop for this position, and since I was known they asked me to apply. They went through a process of discernment and search and then they offered me the position.

What are some of the biggest issues facing Aboriginals today? How can reconciliation be part of addressing these issues?

A number of years ago, the Anglican church said to their Native network, through the Anglican Council of Indigenous Peoples, ”What is it, in light of the devastation and the horror of what has happened to you and our complicity (they didn’t put it that way) - what is it that you would want from us?” They gave a presentation and many people were stunned when the First Nations people just said, “We want you to repudiate the doctrine of discovery.”

The doctrine of discovery is the basis for the residential schools, and the doctrine of discovery is still the structure and the framework of oppression for First Nations people. It implicitly says and not too hidden a way that First Nations people are primitive and because they are primitive it gives the ‘advanced’ people the right to govern, to advise, to counsel, to organize, to structure life and existence for them. That is still so very much alive. It is common now to denounce the cruelties that came from that doctrine, but the results of that, including quite a bit of cruelty, still remain. The effects of it are still with us every day and in the newspapers every day.

There is no meaningful reconciliation possible unless the whole of Canadian society and the churches included are able to repudiate this just stunningly evil way of thinking. Reconciliation is, I think, within grasp because people are beginning to understand through a number of ways how ridiculous and absurd and evil the doctrine of discovery is.

But the church has a special role in it. The church essentially repudiated it a couple hundred years ago, but on the ground, it has lived out of it and acted in that way. The price of acceptance for First Nations people in the larger society is their ability to mimic western institutions and ideas. And now the more benign form of it is to mimic other minorities: the way this thinking goes, if First Nations people could act like other smarter and better minorities, then they’ll be alright. This is just so awful and the effect of it is so bad.

So reconciliation is the acceptance of the authority and identity of First Nations people and their unique relationship to this land, their unique and singular relationship to the history of this land. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission [recently created by the federal government] will hopefully provide a doorway for that kind of prophetic insight into the life of First Nations people in society. I think that reconciliation is dependent upon that recognition of the full humanity and authority of Aboriginal identity, especially in the Canadian context.

How are we working towards this reconciliation?

This is a time of renewal for First Nations people, and I think that it’s happening and it’s going to happen. There are just a lot of things happening from my point of view: spiritual movements, renewals, renewal of the spirit of people, and the Spirit renewing the spirit of people.

One of the things that has surprised me is the way in which an appointment of a National Indigenous Anglican Bishop has inspired imagination and creativity on the part of church institutions to re-imagine what they are who they are and what the roles of First Nations people are and even on a different level, re-imagine the world in which we live.

One of the unique aspects of First Nations life is their amazing refusal to sever the living relationship they have with the land. This of course is surprising and perhaps even confusing to people in the globalizing “culture  of money.” It’s surprising, but First Nations people have clearly given this to me as a task: “Bishop, you are to speak for our living relationship with this land.” In essence what they are saying is that our humanity is shaped by our ecology and we are who we are because of this living relationship with the land. I think more and more people are beginning to understand that, and more and more people are beginning to understand that it’s not just true of Indigenous people but it’s true of everyone.

And as people get insight into those things, there’s kind of a mutual illumination that goes on – insights in one thing give insight into another. That doesn’t mean it isn’t precarious – it’s still an uphill battle. What we see happening in so many parts of Canada to the environment and of course all around the world is an indication that people aren’t aware or don’t understand this living relationship. But more people seem to be learning and hopefully that would continue to happen.

How do these processes of reconciliation bring justice for Aboriginal peoples?

That’s a good question. Felix Cohen, who was an attorney, said that Indigenous people were the miner’s canary of justice: when their rights were understood and respected, you knew that things in general were going in a positive direction. And  justice for Indigenous people, because it involves so many connected issues, is kind of the lynchpin of justice. You can’t have any kind of framework of justice without it. Any system of justice without it is a house of cards – it’s going to collapse, especially in Canadian society. The big moments in Canadian justice for First Nations people is when those things have been recognized and acted upon. I think they ensure that we’re on the right track.

What is the response to the time of renewal you mentioned earlier?

I find the response to these moments of renewal to be encouraging and exciting. I think that people recognize that the Truth and Reconciliation Commission is the first time such a process has happened in history for Indigenous people and that it’s an extraordinary opportunity.

And I’ve found among Native groups – very diverse groups – response to the creation of my position to be enthusiastic. People are inspired by it and they understand what’s at stake and what it implies. The creation of my position is a recognition for the first time by a religious organization on this kind of level of the pre-existing authority of First Nations people and the full humanity of those people within the framework and context of the church. So that’s exciting for people.

There are some people who don’t get it – those are the people we still need to work with – but I think all of these developments show great promise, even though there is still a long way to go. They’re not without opposition, and there are some difficulties. But I’ve found my reception by people to be very encouraging, and I think that the other things will be received positively. I think that many people are beginning to recognize that this is a time of great risk and also a time of great opportunity.

What is the price of not pursuing justice and reconciliation for Aboriginal peoples?

It’s hard to calculate what the price is – it would certainly be lots of pain, strife and difficulty. But I think that God is initiating a trajectory of hope and justice that is looking like it will happen whether people like it or not. This trajectory includes environmental justice.

If we have a liveable future as a community of peoples, those things need to be in place. Indigenous justice needs to be part of our future. I question whether we can have a liveable future apart from it. Certain aspects of Aboriginal justice speak in a prophetic way about what society needs to know regarding its future. No viable part of human life can exist apart from the world, even though society seems to think we can. We can’t overstate Indigenous justice because it implies things critical to us.