No human remains found 2 years after claims of ‘mass graves’ in Canada

[ohio jones]

I am curious as to the personal background that informs your understanding of reality.

My plea is for compassion. Something that all believers in Christ agree to be a worthy lifestyle.

com·pas·sion
/kəmˈpaSH(ə)n/
noun
sympathetic pity and concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others.

My current occupation is full time ministry in with First Nations people in Canada. The people you speak of are my brothers and sisters and have been for the last two decades.

For every person who speaks positively of their Residential School experience, many do not speak positively. I have heard all kinds of stories. Many times. Confinement, starvation, sexual violence, physical violence, manipulation, indoctrination, slavery, family separation, cultural degradation, and more. St. Anne school had an electric chair. The one Mennonite school had a "strapping chair".

I am sorry that your friends were suffering in their home community. I fail to see how that suffering is justification for other suffering caused by the Indian Residential School system.

It seems a compassionate heart would have compassion for both circumstances of suffering, rather than posing one circumstance as justification for another.

I am again calling for the closing of this thread due to the damage it will cause to the name of Christ. Mods?

I did not interpret the mention of "intervening" as an explicit request for closing the thread, though apparently others did. It's rare that we resort to that measure, but if we had, your post above would not have appeared, to provide a correction to the posts you consider uncompassionate. When you see a lack of compassion, continue to call it out and push back against it.

All of us, in all threads and not just this one, should keep in mind that it's easy to make comments that are seen as hurtful by others, especially those closer to the situation than we are. Those posts can be read by anyone at any time, causing damage long after we have forgotten them.

Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.

[Bootstrap]

From the CBC article I cited --

Survivors described the electric chair as being "high-backed with steel arms," according to court files obtained by CBC News that include summaries of the allegations in the OPP documents.

One former male St. Anne's student, who attended the school between 1957 and 1962, said "a supervising nun would make him sit in an electric chair, tie his his wrists to armrests and administer shocks," the court file states.

"The nun strapped him in the electric chair and electrocuted him until he was semiconscious."

A female student, who attended the school between 1957 and 1964, alleged she was forced to eat her vomit and punished by "electrocution" in the chair.

There were also claims in the file that school officials let students use the chair to test endurance, and that it was used for fun.

"A male former student alleged that when he was six to 11 years old, he was tricked into sitting on an electric chair in the recreation room by a supervising nun and an unidentified religious Brother operated the crank which caused him to receive shocks," said the file.

Testimony from survivors and witnesses is not hearsay. It's not rumor.

The 2015 TRC report that called the abuse in the Residential Schools "genocide" was partly based on over 6,000 interviews with survivors and witnesses regarding the abuse they experienced at these schools.

Are you saying that all of these people are lying?

I’m saying if it’s still unsubstantiated with evidence, then it’s still “allegedly.”

If they confessed, I would certainly consider it substantiated.

You don't think eyewitness testimony is evidence? In many, many trials, eyewitness testimony is the primary evidence. This is many years beyond the statute of limitations, I think, I doubt there will be a formal trial, but this eyewitness testimony sure looks like evidence to me.

Do you think people are sometimes guilty of things they do not confess to?

[Falco Knotwise]

From the CBC article I cited --



Testimony from survivors and witnesses is not hearsay. It's not rumor.

The 2015 TRC report that called the abuse in the Residential Schools "genocide" was partly based on over 6,000 interviews with survivors and witnesses regarding the abuse they experienced at these schools.

Are you saying that all of these people are lying?

I’m saying if it’s still unsubstantiated with evidence, then it’s still “allegedly.”

If they confessed, I would certainly consider it substantiated.

You don't think eyewitness testimony is evidence? In many, many trials, eyewitness testimony is the primary evidence. This is many years beyond the statute of limitations, I think, I doubt there will be a formal trial, but this eyewitness testimony sure looks like evidence to me.

Do you think people are sometimes guilty of things they do not confess to?

I see that people have been convicted for various types of abuse so far. Who has been convicted, on the basis of eyewitness testimony, to using an electric chair as part of that abuse?

The existence of an electric chair would indicate to me that many people in authority were in the know about it and stayed silent. You’re asking me to believe that there was a conspiracy between every priest, every nun, to keep silent about it. Not one decent person out of the whole lot of them.

This is hard for me to believe is what I’m saying.

[Ken]

The school closed 51 years ago in 1973 so the priests and nuns who operated it are either long dead or scattered to the winds. Here is a news Story from 28 years ago in the Globe and Mail recounting the existence and use of a homemade electric chair:



First-hand stories from victims





Note, they are talking about an ordinary metal chair with wires and a rheostat attached to it to regulate voltage. They are not talking about one of these things used for executions

[Falco Knotwise]

I guess I could find it more believable like that, yes. The fact is people in general were more physically abusive back then. I had relatives whom I consider to have been physically abusive drunks. (Not so uncommon back then.) I suppose that mentality could have been institutionalized. (Insane!)

As a kid I got the leather belt treatment on occasion. (Normal stuff back then.) Not so much the electric chair and the cat o’nine tails though!

However, if the chair started out as a joke (some kids wanting to see how much they could take, as described in the first video) I could see how it could have become more gradually used as punishment. (Remember the Stanford Prison Experiment, how things that started out as “play” quickly deteriorated.)

It seems that could have happened in this situation.

[Bootstrap]

I guess I could find it more believable like that, yes. The fact is people in general were more physically abusive back then. I had relatives whom I consider to have been physically abusive drunks. (Not so uncommon back then.) I suppose that mentality could have been institutionalized. (Insane!)

As a kid I got the leather belt treatment on occasion. (Normal stuff back then.) Not so much the cat o’nine tails though!

Do you think they did this to children in Catholic schools for white children who were part of mainstream Canadian culture? Does this electric chair seem normal to you?

To me, it feels quite different from a leather belt. Which was also part of my upbringing.

[Falco Knotwise]

I guess I could find it more believable like that, yes. The fact is people in general were more physically abusive back then. I had relatives whom I consider to have been physically abusive drunks. (Not so uncommon back then.) I suppose that mentality could have been institutionalized. (Insane!)

As a kid I got the leather belt treatment on occasion. (Normal stuff back then.) Not so much the cat o’nine tails though!

Do you think they did this to children in Catholic schools for white children who were part of mainstream Canadian culture? Does this electric chair seem normal to you?

To me, it feels quite different from a leather belt. Which was also part of my upbringing.

I’ve heard tales about mean nuns, but certainly none involving electric chairs and cat o’nine tails.

[NedFlanders]

I am curious as to the personal background that informs your understanding of reality.

My plea is for compassion. Something that all believers in Christ agree to be a worthy lifestyle.

com·pas·sion
/kəmˈpaSH(ə)n/
noun
sympathetic pity and concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others.

My current occupation is full time ministry in with First Nations people in Canada. The people you speak of are my brothers and sisters and have been for the last two decades.

For every person who speaks positively of their Residential School experience, many do not speak positively. I have heard all kinds of stories. Many times. Confinement, starvation, sexual violence, physical violence, manipulation, indoctrination, slavery, family separation, cultural degradation, and more. St. Anne school had an electric chair. The one Mennonite school had a "strapping chair".

I am sorry that your friends were suffering in their home community. I fail to see how that suffering is justification for other suffering caused by the Indian Residential School system.

It seems a compassionate heart would have compassion for both circumstances of suffering, rather than posing one circumstance as justification for another.

I am again calling for the closing of this thread due to the damage it will cause to the name of Christ. Mods?

And why do you assume that because my native friend who greatly praised the residential school system or others that were abused in their native upbringing was me jumping to justification of the residential school system?

That is really great you have a ministry to native people, but although you may, it doesn’t grant you any greater ability to know what is going on or in how to relate to these people than someone else.

Does your personal friendships to natives trump everyone else’s?

Are you actually friends of these people as close friends on level ground because you became that naturally or a bit higher and forced because you have a ministry and so you are helping them? I ask because I’ve seen too often this distorts a persons view and can greatly affect how they relate to you. It is like your job.
My native friends have nothing so much to gain from me besides cheap rent at my house. They call me brother almost every time I see them. But for the most part a genuine friendship takes place outside of “I’m ministering to these people.”

[NedFlanders]

And Norm it may be wise to not assume that people aren’t compassionate. Or that you understand correctly what someone is saying on here and thinking sides are being picked in some way.

Recently we had a native man confront myself and a few youth who wanted to share Christ. This native man was not happy with us doing so. And since I grew up in the world I’ve seen enough bar fights, been involved in them, or just altercations outside the bar that I don’t think these youth Mennonite boys had any idea the danger we faced with this man that towered over all of us giving off every cue that he was ready to break someone’s nose.

Do you think if I was not compassionate that we would have ended that confrontation with him giving me a big hug and later telling my son that he had the best dad and was excited he would get to see us again when he felt up to giving me a call?

And if you think I was assuming he would be violent he did tell us he was homeless because of the restraining order on him because of violence. He opened up - when? - when we showed compassion and asking how we could help him.

Are you Norm dealing with these people on a personal level individually? Or just as a general ministry? Do any of them come to your church?
I hope so. And I hope if you are leading others to Christ and sharing his love that you recognize that His compassion is extended to others and His compassion flows through other living sacrifices in ministering to others too.

[temporal1]

I’ve heard tales about mean nuns, but certainly none involving electric chairs and cat o’nine tails.

It’s almost a month, what did you guys do with Falco this time?!
haithabu is still missing, too.