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More than 7,000 people have brought lawsuits against the federal government, the Anglican Church of Canada (ACC) and several other Canadian churches, alleging they were physically or sexually abused by school staff.

The Anglican Church administered 26 government residential schools for indigenous children in various parts of Canada from 1820 until 1969.

Ignoring recommendations from church and other groups, Canada's Department of Justice is seeking to resolve these lawsuits in court. Indigenous, religious and legal groups have urged the government to find a way to settle these claims outside the courts.

In a letter delivered to Prime Minister Chretien on May 2, the Anglican House of Bishops expressed the bishops' "dismay" at the ponderous process of resolving the claims. "Those who were abused still wait for justice and the litigation is rapidly draining [our] resources," the letter states. "We assure you of our ongoing commitment to our ministry of healing among the indigenous peoples of Canada. We will continue this work as long as we are able, but it is now in jeopardy."

Archbishop David Crawley of the Diocese of Kootenay in British Columbia, one of the primary drafters of the statement said, "Between our national church and the eight dioceses in litigation, we have spent about $5 million [US$3.25 million] on litigation. More than 99 percent has gone to the legal process, and less than one percent has gone to actual payments to a plaintiff.

"We expect by the end of this year that assets will be gone, and then in effect the national corporate structure of our church will be bankrupt. We have been in conversations with the federal government since last fall, and they appear to be stalled."

In some lawsuits the ACC's general synod—the church's national governing body—and eight of its 30 dioceses are named directly. But increasingly, Archbishop Crawley said, the Canadian government was forcing the church to be a co-defendant in lawsuits originally brought against the government.

Lawsuits in which the general synod is being sued as a third party account for only 40 percent of the cases involving the church. Yet these cases have predominated in the courts and have generated the major portion of legal fees.

Archbishop Crawley said: "I believe that the government doesn't know what its policy is. Various departments of government are working at odds with one another. The government has been slow to recognize the magnitude of the problem. There are tens of thousands of potential complainants.

"If you add in the so-called cultural and linguistic abuses—the deprivation of language and culture as distinct from physical or sexual abuses—if class actions in that area get certified, then the government will be facing literally billions of dollars in costs."

The lawsuits were threatening the survival of certain dioceses, the archbishop said. For example, the Diocese of Cariboo in British Columbia, one of the first to face the charges, "are no longer defending themselves in court," he said. "They have no assets left. The synod of the diocese passed a resolution last fall that unless there is some kind of agreement reached, the diocese will wind up its affairs as a corporate body this October."

The United Church of Canada (UCC) and the Roman Catholic Church—both also involved in the Indian Residential School program—were not facing the same financial stress as the ACC, according to Archbishop Crawley. The UCC had only two cases pending, he added. The Roman Catholic cases were different as residential schools were run by religious orders. In one of those cases, "the Oblates [religious of the order] in the province of Manitoba have declared bankruptcy and turned all of their assets over to government," the archbishop said.

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June (Web-only) 2001, Vol. 45