Reparations and the hard work of reconciliation
In 2026 Canadian Friends Service Committee (CFSC) and Winnipeg Friends will bring forward a proposal for Friends nationally to make an annual payment of reparations to Indigenous Peoples, in response to living on and benefiting from Indigenous Peoples’ lands. This would be a natural progression of Friends’ reconciliation work.
Friends’ early history with Indigenous Peoples
I don’t remember learning anything about early Quaker history either in school or during my orientation at CFSC. I’m told that romantic stories of William Penn landing in Lenni Lenape territory and founding Pennsylvania circulate in some places. More realistic views about this history will continue to evolve as further historical research is done.
From the first days, some Friends were egalitarian in their approaches and were welcomed by, and had respectful relationships with, Indigenous Peoples. Also, Friends were among those involved in dispossessing Indigenous Peoples’ lands. Some promoted assimilation and sought to compel Indigenous Peoples to adopt European ways and Christian beliefs.
In the US, Friends ran what were called “Indian Boarding Schools.” Like Residential Schools in Canada, the US schools facilitated the seizing of Indigenous children from their families and communities with the express purpose of destroying Indigenous cultures, languages, and spiritualities. Widespread physical, sexual, and spiritual abuse also took place at the schools. Some Friends in the US are currently working with school survivors and their descendants to address this traumatic legacy.
In Canada, residential school survivors won the largest class action suit in the country’s history, a settlement to which some Churches were legal parties. The Religious Society of Friends wasn’t one of them, having not been involved in Residential Schools here. As part of the settlement, Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) was established to document the truth about the schools in Canada. It also issued 94 Calls to Action for reconciliation.
Although not directly involved, like other settlers, Friends were part of the colonial culture of Canada and paid taxes, so in those ways they were as responsible as other citizens of Canada for the Residential School system. Additionally, there is some question about whether Genesee Yearly Meeting was involved with the US schools in the 1860s. Some Friends say that it was, while others who’ve done historical research remain unsure. (Genesee was one of three Yearly Meetings that merged into Canadian Yearly Meeting in 1955.)
In short, Friends both participated directly in, and opposed, the project of colonization. Friends continue to benefit from and be harmed by colonialism. In response, many Friends seek to reconcile for the future, and have been involved in the work of reconciliation for decades. Acknowledging this mixed and at times deeply troubling history is important. The subtitle of the TRC’s final report is Honouring the truth, reconciling for the future.
Canadian Friends Service Committee
CFSC was founded in 1931 and has supported Indigenous Peoples’ human rights since at least the 1960s. Indigenous and non-Indigenous Friends have been involved in this work, and that of reconciliation, for generations. Actions in these early days included engaging in nonviolent activism at the request of the Innu Nation, Grassy Narrows First Nation, and the Lubicon Lake Nation.
Later, Quakers repudiated the racist Doctrine of Discovery and were among the first to collectively commit to decolonization and reporting on the specific actions taken toward reconciliation. Friends then helped found and facilitate a coalition of churches working to advance Indigenous Peoples’ human rights.
How did Quakers—despite being few in number—become a leading non-Indigenous faith-body in Canada working for Indigenous Peoples’ human rights?
In a word: relationships. For almost 30 years, CFSC’s General Secretary, Jennifer Preston, has cultivated relationships of respect and trust with Indigenous partners and organizations. With the support of numerous Friends and colleagues, these relationships have formed the bedrock of our work on Indigenous Peoples’ human rights for decades.
“Amazingly, the UN adopted the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples despite efforts from colonial States like Canada to squash it!”
Jennifer is a highly sought after expert in this area. You might have seen her on national television if you watched the closing ceremony of the TRC in 2015. The commissioners asked her to facilitate a session, during which Grand Chief Wilton Littlechild thanked her and Quakers for their work on reconciliation.
This didn’t happen overnight. This level of trust was built slowly through taking vital actions that, at the time, few noticed.
In 2006-2007 Jennifer and colleagues repeatedly travelled to New York. She put everything on hold for a long series of off-the-record meetings with ambassadors. Why? Because Indigenous Peoples were struggling to get those meetings, but for some reason, governments were willing to meet with human rights nonprofits like CFSC.
So, at the request of Indigenous Peoples, Jennifer and colleagues from Amnesty International spent countless hours correcting misinformation about Indigenous Peoples’ human rights. It paid off. Amazingly, the United Nations (UN) adopted the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples despite efforts from colonial States like Canada to squash it!
As part of this huge success, Jennifer joined with Indigenous partners to help found and coordinate the Coalition for the Human Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The Coalition, which includes many prominent Indigenous organizations and Nations, has been active at the UN and in Canada ever since.
The Coalition has toured and helped to answer questions about international law for Indigenous Nations. It has educated and held states to account at the UN. It has briefed Ministers, Parliamentary Committees, and federal government departments in Canada. It has taught university classes, published a book, and distributed hundreds of thousands of pocket-sized copies of the UN Declaration—dramatically raising the profile of Indigenous Peoples’ human rights.
Along with all this public work, the Coalition has continually worked behind-the-scenes, meeting with key decision-makers in Ottawa to eventually secure another massive win. The Coalition was instrumental in getting Canada to adopt legislation to implement the UN Declaration into all of Canada’s laws. Much work remains to be done, but this promises to be a huge step for Indigenous Peoples’ human rights.
Over the years, CFSC has continued to do this important work alongside Indigenous partners—hosting events, conducting international visits to learn from Indigenous Peoples, intervening at the Supreme Court of Canada in the landmark Tsilhqot’in Nation Aboriginal title case, and much more.
With the support of Indigenous partners who review applications, CFSC runs a Reconciliation Fund that gives money to grassroots Indigenous cultural and language revitalization efforts—an important act of reparations.
CFSC’s work has also always sought to educate Quakers and settlers in the broader public. The CFSC website includes many resources such as the popular Indigenous Voices on Reconciliation video series, where some of CFSC’s Indigenous partners answer questions that many settlers have about reconciliation.
The plan for Friends to introduce annual reparations payments in 2026 builds on this long history. An annual reparations contribution would acknowledge for some our being Treaty people, and for others living on unceded or non-Treaty territories in Canada. Reconciliation demands reparations for dispossession and historic and ongoing injustices. These payments would be part of Friends’ living up to the call to reconcile for the future.
Matthew Legge is CFSC’s Communications Coordinator.
