Cree woman reveals why she ‘spoke the law' to Pope Francis

When Pope Francis arrived at Maskwacis, Alberta to mark the first day of “penitential pilgrimage” to Canada, the attention was not on the holy reverend, but on Si Pih Ko, a Cree woman from Manitoba province, who gave a powerful performance with her song.

The moment was poignant, as an indigenous woman was giving an emotional performance in Cree to the tune of Canada’s national anthem.

The Pope is in Canada to apologise to indigenous people for abuse in government schools run by the Roman Catholic church.

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The visit comes in the backdrop of a 2015 Truth and Reconciliation Commission report becomingpublic which found that these residential schools forcibly separated indigenous children from their parents as part of an effort to convert them to Christianity and assimilate them into the wider Canadian culture.

A total of 150,000 children from Canada’s First Nations tribes were placed in 139 schools run under government contract — most by the Catholic Church — over a 150-year period.

The report said that these schools committed “cultural genocide” and were designed “not to educate” the Indigenous children, “but primarily to break their link to their culture and identity”.

Hence on Monday, when the Pope arrived in Maskwacis, Alberta, she couldn’t control her emotions.

But what ticked her off was the fact that Pope donned a gifted feathered headdress without first removing his skullcap—something she saw as disrespectful.

“He didn’t remove his law before allowing our law to be placed on his head,” she told Reuters by phone from Winnipeg.

The 45-year-old ended her song with a statement on indigenous law, fist raised, before turning her back and walking away as Francis stood and watched.

“It felt good, being able to just sing it and speak it. And he could not destroy it in me,” she was quoted as saying.

She said that she was not at the event to hear the pope’s apology but “to have that opportunity to speak the law to him. No apology will ever make things right.”

She was aware that she would be “speaking the law” to the pope somehow, but added, “I didn’t think it would be right in the centre, hand up like that.”

(With inputs from agencies)

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