IQALUIT, Nunavut -- Pope Francis traveled to the edge of the Arctic on Friday to deliver an apology to the Inuit people for the "evil" of Canada's residential schools, wrapping up his weeklong "penitential pilgrimage" to Canada with a visit to the remote territory of Nunavut to meet with school survivors.
Francis landed in Iqaluit and met with former students at a primary school to hear first-hand their experiences of being torn from their families and forced to attend church-run, government funded boarding schools.
"How evil it is to break the bonds uniting parents and children, to damage our closest relationships, to harm and scandalize the little ones!" Francis told Inuit youths and elders outside the school.
He thanked the school survivors for their courage in sharing their suffering.
"This only renewed in me the indignation and shame that I have felt for months," Francis said. "I want to tell you how very sorry I am and to ask for forgiveness for the evil perpetrated by not a few Catholics who contributed to the policies of cultural assimilation and enfranchisement in those schools."
During his address, he said "I'm sorry" in Inuktitut, the Inuit language. And he ended by saying "thank you" in Inuktitut.
The visit capped an unusual papal tour designed specifically apologize to generations of First Nations, Metis and Inuit for the abuses and injustices they suffered, and assure them that he was committed to helping them reconcile their relationship with the Catholic Church.
After stops in Edmonton, Alberta and Quebec City, Francis ended his pilgrimage in Nunavut. The events stretched far longer than planned.
The pope's plane took off for Rome about 90 minutes behind schedule.
From the late 1800s to the 1970s, more than 150,000 Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their homes and placed in church-run boarding schools to sever them from their cultures and assimilate them into Christian, Canadian society.
The Canadian government has said physical and sexual abuse was rampant at the schools, and Francis begged forgiveness Thursday for the "evil" of clergy sexual abuse committed against young and vulnerable people, vowing an "irreversible commitment" to prevent it from happening again.
The Inuit community is seeking Vatican assistance to extradite an Oblate priest, the Rev. Joannes Rivoire, who ministered to Inuit communities until he left in the 1990s and returned to France.
Canadian authorities issued an arrest warrant for him in 1998 on accusations of several counts of sexual abuse, but it has never been served. The Canadian government said this week Canada had asked France to extradite Rivoire, but did not say when and provided no more details.
Reaction to Francis' visit has been mixed, with even the Canadian government saying his apology didn't go far enough in accepting blame for the institutional role the Catholic Church played in supporting the school policy.
Some school survivors have accepted his apology as genuine and helpful to their process of healing from trauma. Others have demanded the church do more, including provide further information about the fate of children who never returned home from the schools and repudiating the 15th century papal bulls that informed the so-called "Doctrine of Discovery."
It is unlikely that the Vatican itself would hold records concerning the fate of Indigenous children who died at the schools, though it would have documentation on any priests who faced canonical penalties after 2001, and possibly some before then. If the documents exist, they would likely be in the archives of individual religious orders, including the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, which operated 48 Christian-run residential schools.
Pope Francis speaks with Indigenous people on Friday in Quebec City as a part of his papal visit across Canada. More photos at arkansasonline.com/730francis/. (AP/The Canadian Press/Jacques Boissinot)Gallery: Pope travels to Canada's Inuit territory
