The nightmarish discovery last week of the remains of 215 children at a Kamloops institution that for decades forcibly attempted to assimilate young Indigenous people into a wholly different culture despite the consequences hit the country like a bomb.
Of course, nowhere is the grief more intense and the horror so real as in the Indigenous community itself. And this week, two members of the Penticton Indian Band spoke on the subject with PentictonNow.
The first, Greg Gabriel, is the band's chief. The second is Greg's niece Crystal Gabriel, who lives on the reserve and has spent several days piecing together a heart-wrenching memorial on her property fence.
We were happy to chat with both, but especially the chief, who graciously took a few minutes from what was clearly a most difficult time.
He cautioned us that some of his opinions were as a community member rather than its leader. And he was forthright.
"There's no doubt that the news that came out last week was shocking," he said. "It affected a lot of our community members, as well as every other community."
"It hit a lot of the residential survivors in our own community. It impacted them so much more than anyone else. The news has reopened the grief, the pain, and the hurt that they suffered when they were taken from their families and placed in residential schools."
Gabriel confirmed that the PIB was and is home to "many members" who were directly impacted by the residential school system.
"But many of them have now passed on," he added. "The trauma of residential schools impacted a lot of people in ways they couldn't handle."
Yet the Kamloops institution wasn't the only unwanted destination for young PIB members.
"We also had band members who attended the residential schools in Cranbrook and Coqualeetza (near Chilliwack)," said Gabriel. "And we're helping all of them cope and deal with this trauma that they have to relive. We have our service teams at their disposal."
Gabriel believes there will be more discoveries like the one in Kamloops. And, he said, the suspicions ran deep for many years.
"I have no doubt more will be found. I have family members who attended Kamloops, Cranbrook, and Coqualeetza, but this particular situation with Kamloops, my family members had their suspicions that it was true that there were burial sites there. There were areas they were forbidden to play in, or be around.
"They had some sort of knowledge that they were there."
We asked Gabriel if he could foresee anything constructive ultimately coming from the discovery.
"I guess that's the question I struggle with," he answered. "I'm so angry. So very angry in terms of this dark part of Canadian history. I consider it genocide. And I have no idea how it will ever be fixed to the satisfaction of not only the survivors, but the communities that have been impacted.
"In my mind its part of a continued agenda on behalf of the government of Canada to essentially exterminate our history, of us as a nation. And the residential school and the Catholic Church involvement, was all a part of that agenda. One only has to look at the history and the records that are now starting to come out."
It doesn't come as a surprise that Gabriel is not a fan of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, established in 2008 and closed in 2015.
"I truly believe it's completely failed," he said. "In my own opinion, the payment to residential school survivors was an insult. The people responsible for this, the government of Canada, the Catholic Church right to the pope, the queen of England, were all a part of this. And they need to be held accountable."
Still, Gabriel says it's not a time for revenge.
"Definitely not," he said. "There are relationships we've established and built over the years and I know those will go on.
"One of our survivors who was in our community meeting the other night made it clear we don't want to use this tragic event as a means for revenge. We want to use it as a way to help one another bring resolution to these outstanding issues.
"But there is so much hurt and grief and pain in our community right now that we will be dealing with for years to come."
We thanked the Chief for his thoughts and then stopped by the home of Crystal Gabriel, where her perimeter fence is covered with bits of colourful construction paper, each cut into the shape of a little T-shirt and containing the name of a residential school survivor, some of whom have now passed away.
It was something she felt she had to do.
"The day after we heard the news," she said, "I put it out to anyone in the community or anyone in the Facebook word really, that whoever would like to honour their survivors, I would display it for them."
The flood was immediate, and ongoing. Gabriel estimated she'd hang another 40 to 50 T-shirts in the 24 hours after we spoke.
"And some people brought their own signs and hung them themselves," she added.
Maybe one day Crystal Gabriel won't feel the need to hang little T-shirts from her fence. Maybe one day Greg Gabriel will feel some measure of solace.
But now is not that time.
