Pope arrives in Canada to apologize for Indigenous school abuse

Pope Francis arrived in Canada on Sunday for a six-day visit during which he is expected to personally apologise to Indigenous survivors of abuse committed at residential schools run by the Catholic Church.

The papal plane landed shortly after 11:00 am (1700 GMT) in Edmonton, the provincial capital of Alberta. 

The 85-year-old pontiff said on the flight that "we must be aware that this is a penitential journey," before greeting journalists accompanying him on board, despite knee pain that has forced him to use a cane or wheelchair in recent outings.

The head of the world's 1.3 billion Catholics will be met at Edmonton's international airport by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at 11:20 am (1720 GMT).

Francis' Canada visit is primarily to apologize to survivors for the Church's role in the scandal that a national truth and reconciliation commission has called "cultural genocide".

Before he left Rome earlier Sunday, the pope said on Twitter he was making a "penitential pilgrimage" that "might contribute to the journey of reconciliation already undertaken".

He will be joined on the visit by his diplomacy chief, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican's second most senior official.

From the late 1800s to the 1990s, Canada's government sent about 150,000 First Nations, Metis and Inuit children into 139 residential schools run by the Church, where they were cut off from their families, language and culture. 

Many were physically and sexually abused by headmasters and teachers.

Thousands of children are believed to have died of disease, malnutrition or neglect. 

Since May 2021, more than 1,300 unmarked graves have been discovered at the sites of the former schools. 

A delegation of Indigenous peoples travelled to the Vatican in April and met the pope -- a precursor to Francis' six-day trip -- after which he formally apologized.

But doing so again on Canadian soil will be of huge significance for survivors and their families, for whom the land of their ancestors is of particular importance.

The 10-hour flight constitutes the longest since 2019 for the 85-year-old pope, who has been suffering from knee pain that has forced him to use a cane or wheelchair in recent outings.

The pope was in a wheelchair Sunday and used a lifting platform to board the plane, an AFP correspondent accompanying him said.

 - 'Too late' -
After resting Sunday, the pope will travel Monday to the community of Maskwacis, some 100 kilometres (62 miles) south of Edmonton, and address an estimated crowd of 15,000 expected to include former students from across the country. 

"I would like a lot of people to come," said Charlotte Roan, 44, interviewed by AFP in June. The member of the Ermineskin Cree Nation said she wanted people to come "to hear that it wasn't made up". 

Others see the pope's visit as too little too late, including Linda McGilvery with the Saddle Lake Cree Nation near Saint Paul, about 200 kilometres east of Edmonton.  

"I wouldn't go out of my way to see him," said the 68-year-old. 

"For me it's kind of too late, because a lot of the people suffered, and the priests and the nuns have now passed on." 

McGilvery spent eight years of her childhood in one of the schools, from age six to 13. 

"Being in the residential school I lost a lot of my culture, my ancestry. That's many years of loss," she told AFP. 

After a mass before tens of thousands of faithful in Edmonton on Tuesday, Francis will head northwest to an important pilgrimage site, the Lac Sainte Anne. 

Following a July 27-29 visit to Quebec City, he will end his trip in Iqaluit, capital of the northern territory of Nunavut and home to the largest Inuit population in Canada.

There he will meet with former residential school students, before returning to Italy.

In total, Francis is expected to deliver four speeches and four homilies, all in Spanish.