A time for reflecting on reconciliation

When the mountain being climbed is daunting, it sometimes pays to pause on the ascent to take note of how far one has come and the distance yet to cover.

Canada's National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, as one of its many solemn purposes, provides an annual moment for stock-taking.

And if Indigenous peoples are understandably frustrated at the slow pace of change, they can be certain that reconciliation is an issue well and truly planted in the national consciousness, that the silence of past generations has been broken and that gains are underway.

As Canada marks the second annual day of commemoration for children who died in residential schools, their families and survivors, the voices of First Nations, Metis and Inuit artists, political and cultural leaders have never been stronger, and their messages, impossible to contradict, are being heard.

In the last year alone, Pope Francis belatedly acknowledged the genocide" of Indigenous people in Canada.

Prince Charles - not long before becoming king - said on a tour of Canada that we must listen to the truth of the lived experience of Indigenous peoples and we should work to understand better their pain and suffering."

In September, a new semester began at Metropolitan Toronto University, the former Ryerson, a name change made at the insistence of Indigenous groups opposed to honouring an architect of the residential school system.

Just this week, Governor General Mary Simon - the first Indigenous person to hold the post - attended the James Smith Cree Nation in Saskatchewan to support grieving residents reeling from a mass murder there.

The 2021 census enumerated 1.8 million Indigenous people in Canada, accounting for five per cent of the population and the fastest growing and youngest demographic in the country.

With such forces in motion, there can be no going back on the process of reconciliation.

If there is a formula for such things, it usually goes something like this: Attention. Awareness. Acknowledgment. Action.

Canadians, for too long oblivious to the consequences of their own history but now knowing the painful truth, must insist that governments take up responsibility for the last of those stages.

The day of remembrance itself is one of 94 actions called for by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The remaining recommendations provide a road map for the country. Governments, in consultation with Indigenous partners, must determine the speed.

A useful guide in picking up the pace is to look at the reality for First Nations, Metis and Inuit in Canada through the lens of Maslow's famed Hierarchy of Needs.

Canada's continuing shame, 10 years after Idle No More lit a decade of Indigenous activism, is that we fail those living on reserves at the most fundamental levels - the human need for food, water and shelter, for personal security, for health, order, law.

Those who suffer most from such failings are children and youth. Indigenous children are disproportionately taken into care. Indigenous young people are disproportionately incarcerated.

There can be no excuse for victimizing further generations of Indigenous young people.

Indigenous peoples seek their rights, not sympathy, they want atrocities acknowledged, treaties met, debts paid.

In that, there is much mountain yet to climb.