Unintended Consequences

We hear it every day, “I didn’t mean it!”  I did not intend to hurt someone.”  REALLY?  One of the assumptions that goes hand-in-hand with this is that if I never intended to do something, I should be absolved if the outcome is not what was intended.  One could write a book of examples where this reality is expressed in stories about human relationships.  Applicable to any relationship, we might want to consider where this applies within some of our most critical social issues of the day.

Recently, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission completed its work and we heard thousands of stories of well-intentioned care-givers who perpetrated some horrific actions in attempting to wipe out the aboriginal culture, language and heritage.  Added to this exercise of power over people, the unintended results of abuse added significant trauma to the life experience of children and their children today.  As civil servants and Christian community servers we would never consciously want to destroy a person and yet this is exactly what occurred.  The Impact of those actions is inter-generational.

So many times I can recall in my own life making “funny” comments about someone’s race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation.  I was never a person who would knowingly hurt another human person.  And yet, my ‘funny’ comments were heard and received and felt by others around me.  What was the impact?  Some maybe laughed nervously, some were embarrassed for me, some were even angry with me because (I didn’t know they were gay?) they felt pushed further back into isolation from the world.  I never intended to hurt them….I would NEVER!!!  But I did!

Today we are hearing more and more about the progress we have made in our society in insuring the civil rights of all persons.  And, indeed, we have.  I want to suggest that the arena where we have made the least progress in this regard is within our own hearts.  Our heads have come to know and accept the appropriate parameters for relationships among ourselves in our world; our hearts have just not caught up.  Why else would there be such continued experience of racism in our North American world?  We see people and form opinions about them.  Those external opinions form judgments and we react accordingly.  It may be fear of the unknown; it may be influenced by values and beliefs we were taught as children.  We know intuitively that what is different will take us out of our comfort zone more often than not.

I remember the words of the song from the seventies that went, “Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me…”   Gradually we veered away from that notion giving way to working on systemic peace.  We needed to change systems to make peace, to free the oppressed and uplift the poor.  Today, we still believe this systemic perspective and rightly so.  Systemic racism and prejudice is a significant concern.  But have we thrown out the baby with the bathwater?  Can we simply change the rules of engagement, the laws, the policies and the parameters in such matters and still be able to humanly relate to one another in an open, compassionate, give and receive manner without first changing our own hearts?  The answer, my friend, is still blowing in the wind!

My old friend, Bob Carty, wrote a song called Desert Eyes.  It tells a story of when city folks went to the desert for a ‘different retreat’ they were confronted with the parched, arid, stark reality of the desert and they became depressed and desolate about what they saw. After a few days and with the help of their guide, they found their desert eyes to see the true life that lives in the desert- the licken, flowers, seeds and animals, etc. With desert eyes they could discover the real beauty, life and wisdom held within the sand and pebbles.  They discovered that with different eyes they also saw that they could be the water of life in that different reality.  As so, too, we can be mindful of our own need to form desert eyes in relation to others who may seem so different and removed from our own comfort zone.  Once we nurture that vision within our own eyes and hearts, we too can be the water of life to our relationships and will embrace change with a new and different vision of what the future might be.

Mary Euphrasia, who founded the Sisters of the Good Shepherd, once taught her young sisters about their work with such marginalized young women.  She said,  “It is not enough that you love them (intent), they must know they are loved (impact).  I guess in her own way she knew about the importance of mindful awareness of what we say and do with one another.  She knew that what you do is far more important than what you say.

I never intended to ramble on like this, but I hope that the impact is noteworthy.

Truth & Reconciliation Commission...a time for Healing Change

We are Good Shepherd People.  We provide services for women and children who are truly marginalized in our world through significant trauma, child welfare involvement, youth pregnancy, poverty and mental health issues including addictions of all sorts.  We work from a Good Shepherd service philosophy founded on the individual dignity of each person and with a degree of respect and compassion that demands we embody the values we declare.  Our service providers are dedicated and hard-working; they desire nothing less than the best outcomes for those they serve….”It is not enough to say we love them, THEY must know they are loved”.

I haven’t blogged in some time.  Too many balls in the air not the least of all are some of the most significant issues of our times that send me reeling with the disconnect between what we say we believe and what we must be in the face of evil, human weakness and the pain and suffering experienced  by people in this wonderful world of ‘opportunity’.  

One of those disconnects for me is the process ongoing related to our Aboriginal Peoples in Canada.  The destructive, evil, traumatizing legacy of Residential Schools and the basis of racism that spawned such experiences is a national embarrassment to all good citizens of this country.  If we are not embarrassed, we either are ill informed, unaware or don’t care.  And if we don’t care we are subject to the same indictment of our American neighbours’ treatment of the African American population and that sorry racist history.

I worry that the findings and the outcomes from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission will find their way on to the same dusty shelves of legislators as have so many of Canada’s other inquiries.  I worry that like so many of the UN charters of rights (children, women, indigenous peoples) this will find Canada as a signatory country that never integrates these charters into law or policy.  Just superficial photo-opps!

I want to muse somewhat about what this might mean to us, if anything.  As care givers, our founding story is rooted in the history of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd.  While they are truly a traditional congregation of Catholic Religious nuns who exist in 73 countries around the world, they have been an inspiration of what it means to work for others to alleviate pain and sufferings at all levels of life.  They have been remarkably open about sharing their mission and their work with many people of different religious traditions and cultures.  They have placed themselves at times in harm’s way for the sake of rescuing a life of a child, young mother or any other person.  They have stood as advocates against unjust systems and practices to try their best to make a difference to this wounded world.  Even now as they are in some decline in membership, they dare to allow themselves to be ‘energized by their Spirit and risk together for mission’.  Their International General Chapter is going on right now and they courageously look to the future directions of their formidable group of Sisters and Mission Partners.

The voices and stories of many thousands of Aboriginal persons are being heard telling their truth of horror through the residential schools system.  We see every day how the children of those victims are impacted by that history.  We have parents and grandparents come to some of our programs and seeing the traditional symbols of our own history, they begin to react with fear that maybe we might be just like those other places.  And yet in their time of great need they honour us by entrusting the care of their children into our hands….what a privilege and exceptional mandate we share!  We are learning more about the inheritance of trauma through multi-generations and how the complexity of trauma will need as much fidelity of support and care and take many generations to heal….but we must start NOW!

But how and what do we do with this experience?   What are we called to in walking this journey with even one aboriginal person who comes to our attention?  Each of us will encounter another person whose tradition comes out of the aboriginal history.  Will we simply be people of sympathy or will our commitment to service draw us to doing what we can to help remediate some of the causal factors that have brought them to this place in time?  Are we called in this time in our Canadian history to risk for mission by dreaming and envisioning how we might become more engaged in this story and work differently to help reconciliation become a reality in the lives of the aboriginal persons we meet?  Whether it is within small groups, a service system or with one single person WE must change.

We share a small but rich network of colleagues and friends whose work has been inspired by Good Shepherd.  We each have different mandates and service needs and our individual agencies have their own specific challenges.  But we have agreed to remain connected and supportive of one another.  One agency within our group is located in Manitoba and over 80% of the children and families served are aboriginal.  What can we do to be supportive to them in this challenging work and inspire in them and within ourselves to dream about the possibilities of being instruments of reconciliation in the work?

I have a dream!  I want to explore where there are individuals and or groups who are directly offering real supports for reconciliation and healing within the aboriginal communities.  Where are the advocates who work toward substantive change in policy and the practice of law and who want reconciliation to be truly something far deeper than simply making financial awards of compensation for past harm…While that helps…it does not heal.  I am looking for healers who will be willing to share with us how they help heal themselves and others in the aboriginal community.  I want to hear from them if we, healers in Good Shepherd, might be worthy to walk with them in providing new and more effective ways of being a healing presence in the community.  Are there any dedicated Centres of Reconciliation for our Aboriginal communities?  If not, why?  Will initiatives like those centres of reconciliation offer potential for sharing a real healing journey with wounded and traumatized aboriginal people?

Where do I start?  How might I get the important information?  Anyone interested in exploring opportunities with me?   Email me @   bob.interbartolo@gmail.com