And now:[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
Date: Thu, 04 Nov 1999 18:06:01 -0500
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
From: Lynne Moss-Sharman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: (2) canada nov 04 1999
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Donor pulls Shingwauk memorial fund
By DAN BELLEROSE, The Sault Ste Marie Star 11.04.99
A memorial fund set up to research the Shingwauk native residential school
is being withdrawn from Algoma University College after the donor learned
that former students plan a major class-action lawsuit. Ken Ingle, who
established the Ruth A. Ingle and Fred B. Ingle Memorial Shingwauk Heritage
Fund in recognition of his parents, announced the withdrawal of the bequest
in a release.
"I had been led to believe by members of AUC's faculty that the native
people who had attended the school were seeking a more constructive way of
dealing with their past than the polarized hostilities of the civil
courts,'' says Ingle.
His parents worked at Shingwauk, the first Anglican Church native
residential school established in Canada, in the late 1930s, early 1940s
and briefly in the 1950s.
Ingle has learned that a group of former aboriginal students at Shingwauk
School, which earlier occupied the college site, are retaining a lawyer to
bring a major class-action lawsuit against the Anglican Church. The civil
action, according to Ingle, has the support of the Shingwauk Trust,
responsible for the property and monies awarded to the native people in an
earlier settlement that established the original college site.
"Unfortunately, the decision of the native people to move to money and
negative confrontation in the civil courts in relation to Shingwauk School
leaves me in a position where I cannot allow my family's memory potentially
to become associated with blanket statements of intolerance and abuse. "The
Ingle family has always believed in justice for aboriginal people. However,
the road they are currently choosing to walk is, sadly, one they must take
without our support.'' As well, Ingle said, AUC "is not ready to assume
additional major responsibilities associated with custodianship of complex
bequests or administration of proactive funds.'' He said the combination of
an economic downturn in Sault Ste. Marie and major cutbacks in provincial
funding have taken their toll on the possibility of community participation
and college administration of new
projects. AUC was studying the possibility of becoming the
native/non-native Shingwauk University where all cultures could meet and
learn together as equals, Ingle said. Working co-operatively, it was hoped
that the native people could learn to heal the pain of the past and forge a
constructive new future for themselves.
The college already had a strong and diversified native studies program,
according to Ingle, and this would be expanded to become a unique learning
experience for anyone who chose to seek it out.
"I believed that in this environment the fund I was establishing would have
a chance to help explore and explain the full story of the residential
school's past, dealing with both the positive and negative aspects of its
complex history,'' said Ingle. "I have worked to try to see the bequest
well settled in and the fund
launched into activeness," writes Ingle, a Waterloo resident.
"I have determined that my intentions for both were premature in terms of
actual possibilities given current circumstances.
Celia Ross, president of AUC, has taken the withdrawal in stride.
"It's unfortunate that Ken is severing connections with us but it is not a
major setback for the university,'' said Ross.
The fund was launched a year ago with a $2,500 donation and was expected to
be eventually supplemented by the estate of Ken Ingle, diagnosed with
cancer five years ago, upon his death. Ingle had donated his mother's
hand-made native memorabilia, the majority
from St. Phillip's Anglican School in Fort George, Que., near James Bay, as
well as a photograph collection of Shingwauk and its staff and students, to
the university in 1997. Additional items in a series of collections were
later donated upon the death of his father.
Natives issues key challenge for universities, forum told
By Gerry Klein Saskatoon Star Phoenix 11.04.99
One of the major challenges facing universities from Tierra del Fuego to
the Arctic is to make themselves more accessible to indigenous people,
according to the head of University of Saskatchewan International (USI).
That was the message that came out of a recent forum at Wanuskewin. The
forum was set up by USI and the
Native Law Centre on campus to find a way to promote the advancement of the
indigenous people in the Americas during next year's Organization of
American States (OAS) meeting to be held in Canada.
The forum included a keynote speech from provincial court Judge Mary Ellen
Turpel-Lafond on the need for post-secondary institutions to adapt in order
to make sure Natives feel part of the system.
The gathering was held to discuss ways to promote an agenda for the OAS
meeting and for the 2001 Summit of the Americas - also to be held in Canada
- that includes seeking ways to better the lives of the continent's
aboriginal peoples, said Asit Sarkar, USI's
director. Most American countries have recognized this issue as
critical in terms of future economic and social development, Sarkar said.
Canada's work along these lines - and more critically, that of the U of S -
is seen as a model most countries would like to follow.
Sarkar said he would like to see the indigenous issue dominate a People's
Summit that will be held in conjunction with the Summit of the Americas.
The university is working with the Canadian government
and the Assembly of First Nations (AFN)to not only make sure this happens
but to make sure the agenda is something that is approved by the
stakeholders, he said. Last weekend's meeting in Saskatoon was to lay the
groundwork for this summit by talking to local and national stakeholders.
USI also wants to organize a
meeting with continental stakeholders, perhaps somewhere in Central
America, sometime next year, Sarkar said. Unlike other development efforts
that have raised the ire of powerful people in Latin American countries,
the notion of educating indigenous people isn't seen as a political threat
but is viewed as a valuable tool for
economic development, he said. For that reason - and the fact the United
Nations has recognized this as the decade of indigenous people - there is a
good chance USI's agenda will make it to the
top of the program over the next two years. If that should happen it would
greatly raise the U of S's profile internationally, Sarkar said. "We will
pursue this agenda," he said. "No one who was at this meeting thought this
issue wasn't relevant. And from our own institution's point of view, people
see this as a very positive thing to do."Not only can the Americas benefit
from the U of S
experience in enhancing the lives of Natives in the university and the
province, the university will also benefit from the connections it will
make throughout this side of the world, Sarkar said.
~~~~~
Grieving aunt wants inquiry
Salim Jiwa, Vancouver Province 11.04.99
A distraught aunt wants a full inquiry by the ministry for
children and families to determine why little Amanda Simpson died.
The four-year-old Prince George girl died at B.C.'s Children's Hospital
Tuesday from massive head injuries she received inside her home on
Saturday. Her mother told relatives that one of Amanda's three sisters had
knocked her down the stairs, said the child's paternal aunt, Arlene Pooli,
of Valemount. The children's father, Marcel Simpson, was headed to Prince
George from his home in Brooks, Alta., to see his remaining three
daughters. Simpson and Jerry Walton, the girls' mother, separated about two
years ago. Prince George RCMP have begun a homicide probe. RCMP spokesman
Const. Mike Herchuk said Walton was not at home at the time. Her other
children, Aimee, 3, Amber, 5, and Ashley, 7, were home with her 34-year-old
common-law husband. Herchuk said a Prince George RCMP officer has
travelled to Vancouver to attend Amanda's autopsy. The children's ministry
has apprehended the three other girls. Children and Families Minister Lois
Boone called the death a tragedy and said she's launched a review of the
incident. She said the ministry has had previous dealings with the family.
"We'll find out what we as a ministry did, and if there's things we could
have done differently -- and if there's things we should have done
differently," said
Boone. - with Southam Newspapers
~~~~~~~
Vancouver bishop blocks visit by Asian Anglican
Conservative church members are crying censorship over the
ban on Singapore-based Archbishop Moses Tay.
Douglas Todd, Sun Religion Reporter Vancouver Sun 11.04.99
Vancouver's Anglican bishop has blocked the planned visit to B.C. of a
prominent Anglican archbishop from Asia who opposes homosexual rights and
believes native totem poles contain evil spirits.
Conservative Anglicans are accusing Bishop Michael Ingham of censorship.
But Ingham said he barred the visit of Moses Tay, the top Anglican in
Southeast Asia, because he feared Tay would disrupt
sensitive discussions within the Vancouver diocese over blessing same-sex
unions and handling past abuse at church-run native
residential schools.
Ingham's decision to stop St. Matthew's Church in Abbotsford from bringing
Tay to an event next year has disappointed and angered many conservative
Anglicans in B.C. and elsewhere, who have been criticizing Ingham on an
Internet Web site. But Ingham said Archbishop Tay "has been very aggressive
in his anti-homosexual and homophobic stance," to the point of opposing
even discussing homosexual issues, because he doesn't want "any polluting
literature" in his churches.
Ingham said that when Tay was last in B.C. about 10 years ago, he organized
prayer meetings to exorcise the evil spirits from totem poles after seeing
them in Stanley Park.
"I'm all for theological diversity, but I'm concerned his visit would harm
my attempts to create dialogue and mutual listening in the diocese." Even
though Singapore-based Tay has a much more elevated rank than Ingham in the
worldwide Anglican communion (Tay is the primate, or head, of the Anglican
church for all of Southeast Asia), Ingham has the right to temporarily ban
him. Church protocol says local bishops must give permission before other
Anglican officials enter their diocese. Ingham, considered one of Canada's
most liberal Anglican bishops and a supporter of blessing same-sex unions,
said Wednesday he has previously approved of numerous prominent
conservative Anglicans, including John Stott and Tom Wright, coming to
Vancouver to speak and teach. Ingham said he received the unanimous support
of senior Anglicans in Vancouver before making his decision regarding Tay.
As well, Ingham said most Canadian bishops support his ban of Tay, whom he
calls "a schismatic" who won regional church election as primate mainly
because the small Southeast Asian Anglican church is dominated by
Pentecostals.
Reverend Trevor Walters, the priest for St. Matthew's Anglican Church in
Abbotsford, would not speak to The Vancouver Sun Wednesday. His secretary
said Ingham forbade him from talking to the media. But Walters has
complained about Ingham to the creator of a conservative Anglican Web site
based in Washington, D.C., run by David Virtue, religion reporter for
Vancouver's Province newspaper in the 1970s. "I was shocked, hurt and
angered when I heard the news," about Tay's ban, Walters told Virtue, whose
Web site is called Virtuosity and claims 50,000 readers a week. "This is
typical of the kind of intolerance liberals have toward conservatives.
Their notion of who is and who is not acceptable goes only one way --
towards the liberal and radical revisionist wing of the church."
Ingham said he has no intention of punishing Walters, a leader of the large
evangelical conservative wing of Vancouver's Anglican church, for his
latest remarks. But Ingham said he has recently asked Walters to refrain
from making disrespectful comments through the media.
Anglican Reverend Ed Hird, who brought Tay to Vancouver in the early 1990s
to lead a conference on church growth, said he was surprised that Ingham
has banned the controversial Tay. "I have a very high opinion of Archbishop
Tay," Hird said. "He's very outspoken. You know Chinese Christians: They
tend to say what they think." Hird said many Anglicans are asking why Tay
is shut out of Vancouver
when controversial liberal bishops, such as John Shelby Spong of the U.S.
and Richard Holloway of Scotland, have been welcomed to the diocese.
"Let Us Consider The Human Brain As
A Very Complex Photographic Plate"
1957 G.H. Estabrooks
www.angelfire.com/mn/mcap/bc.html
FOR K A R E N #01182
who died fighting 4/23/99
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
www.aches-mc.org
807-622-5407
For people like me, violence is the minotaur; we spend our lives
wandering its maze, looking for the exit. (Richard Rhodes)
Never befriend the oppressed
unless you are prepared to
take on the oppressor.
(Author unknown)
