Indigenous Justice

“With that we face the shocking reality. Jesus stands at the door and knocks. He asks for help in the form of a beggar, a down-and-out, a man in ragged clothes, someone who is sick, even a criminal in need of our love. He meets you in every person you encounter in need. So long as there are people around, Christ walks the earth as your neighbor, as the one through whom God calls to you, demands of you, makes claims upon you. That is the great seriousness of the Advent message and its great blessing. Christ stands at the door. He lives in the form of people around us.

Adrian Jacobs and Cindy Stover join us in this episode to explore Hearts Exchanged, an eight-month learning journey fostering reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities. Discover how participants deepen understanding through storytelling, on-the-land learning, and group reflection, turning education into action and building lasting relationships rooted in justice and respect.

Gentle shepherd come and lead us
For we need You to help us find our way
In the day when our ears are bombarded by beckoning voices
And our world is polluted with sound
Lord, let us hear you

- Gentle Shepherd 

At Waterloo CRC we have a group of folks who are learning about justice for Indigenous peoples and are committed to acting on that knowledge. We call ourselves JIP – Justice and Indigenous Peoples.

The book of Genesis begins with a beautiful telling of the creation of the universe. It is a good creation and after humanity is on the scene it is a very good creation. The human story is a beautiful one with communion with the Creator, a beautiful garden, relationship with animals, the beginning of family life, and all of this takes place in a time of harmony.

Our Hearts Exchanged cohort spent time learning about the Doctrine of Discovery through readings, videos, stories and conversation. We had taken in the magnitude of how contrary to the way of Jesus this was and how incredibly inappropriate it was for the church to make such a declaration. We felt the weight of its harm and destruction. Reading and processing it together was an important part of the exchanging hearts experience. We were invited to respond, here is my poetic lament that was part of my Hearts Exchanged journey.

In my email to the editor of Do Justice, I asked, ‘How can I talk about how our bodies are disposed of in the dump or in the river and without being blunt, crude, disrespectful or violently graphic about it?’  I am not exaggerating. This is happening way too often. We Indigenous women are being murdered, then denied proper funerals (left in a landfill and in the rivers) and our families are left with no ceremony to help heal from the violent death of our loved ones. Our legal system hasn’t provided the justice balm needed to move beyond grief.