WASHINGTON (DC)
Axios [Arlington VA]
June 14, 2024
By Russell Contreras
U.S. Catholic bishops apologized Friday for the Catholic Church’s part in fostering “a history of trauma” on Indigenous children at church-run boarding schools where priests sexually abused students.
Why it matters: It’s an official acknowledgment of the church’s past abuse against Indigenous children as the extent of widespread abuses inflicted on Native children over many decades has come into sharper focus.
Zoom in: The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops approved by an 181-2 vote the document “Keeping Christ’s Sacred Promise: A Pastoral Framework for Indigenous Ministry” in Louisville, Kentucky, as part of the apology.
- “The system itself left a legacy of community and individual trauma that broke down family and support systems among Indigenous communities,” the document said, referring to boarding schools.
- The document didn’t mention sexual abuse but said the church must “increase awareness and break the culture of silence that surrounds all types of afflictions and past mistreatment and neglect.”
- The document also gave new guidelines for ministering to Indigenous Catholics.
Catch up quick: Indigenous children at the U.S.’s 408 federal Indian boarding schools suffered whippings, sexual abuse, forced labor and severe malnourishment between 1819 and 1969, a 2022 Interior Department report found.
- The boarding schools were part of the American government’s campaign to compel Native American assimilation into white culture.
- An Interior Department investigation identified marked or unmarked burial sites at roughly 53 different schools.
- The Catholic Church was one of many groups that took part in the boarding school system.
Zoom out: A Washington Post investigation published in May documented pervasive sexual abuse by priests at boarding schools in remote regions of the Midwest and Pacific Northwest, including Alaska.
- Since the 1890s, at least 122 priests, sisters and brothers assigned to about two dozen of the schools were accused of sexually abusing Native American children, The Post investigation found.
- The majority of documented cases, involving more than 1,000 children, happened in the 1950s and 1960s, per The Post.
Between the lines: The apology about boarding schools is the latest acknowledgment by the Catholic Church for its troubled history with Native Americans in the U.S.
- New Mexico, a state with more than 20 tribes, was at the center of sexual abuse scandals years before the Boston Globe’s 2002 “Spotlight” investigation into the church’s cover-up of clergy abuse.
- The Servants of Paraclete facility, formerly known as Via Coeli in northern New Mexico, served for years as a place to treat priests from around the country who were accused of sexual abuse.
- Those priests were later assigned to parishes across New Mexico and Arizona where they continued to abuse Native American and Latino children, according to various lawsuits.
Don’t forget: Native Americans are roughly 4% of U.S. Catholics. More than 350 parishes serve predominantly Indigenous people, according to USCCB statistics.
- Historical Indigenous Catholic churches can be found in places like Taos Pueblo.