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Sorry is the hardest word

I'm sorry. These two words can have a profound impact on a relationship. If said from a place of deep felt contrition and the acceptance of responsibility for wrongdoing, "I'm sorry" can start a path to the recovery of trust and care.
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I'm sorry.

These two words can have a profound impact on a relationship. If said from a place of deep felt contrition and the acceptance of responsibility for wrongdoing, "I'm sorry" can start a path to the recovery of trust and care. There have been a number of state and institutional apologies for past wrongs including this week's apology by Georgetown University for its historic link to slavery. That story along with two other moments in my life merged and gave me pause to think about the act of saying sorry as well as the responsibilities of citizenship and professional duty.

The first moment was a video that showed up in my Facebook feed. I usually flip through the news feed quickly to see what's up. I tend to ignore the embedded videos in favour of searching the postings from friends who are sharing the joys and the challenges of their lives. It's not a perfect way to connect with friends. I would rather share a coffee face-to-face but it does make-do when coffee times are limited by work and family commitment.

Anyway, on this particular morning I was drawn to a beautiful smile. The moment was captured in a video paused in a still moment and underneath the picture it said, "First Aboriginal Woman MP."

I tapped the play button and watched the inaugural speech of Linda Burney to the Australian Parliament. I heard her speak in her own language and watched as she shared the kangaroo pelt that told her life story.

She said: "The first decade of my life was spent as a non-citizen."

She said: "I was born at a time when a white woman having an aboriginal baby was shocking."

Among other things, the video goes on to say that: "The state forcibly removed mixed race children from their families." The video was sobering. The one minute and 3 second video did not capture the whole story. Clearly the joy of making the historic breakthrough into Parliament comes with heavy responsibility of saying what needs to be said.

It was reported in The Telegraph that she later "slammed calls for the watering down of the Racial Discrimination Act and warned that Aboriginal Australians still suffered disproportionately high rates of poverty and ill-health." And she said: "Recognition of the First People in our nation's constitution is the next step on the path we are walking towards, a country that can look itself in the eye knowing that we have come of age[.]" (This citation is also from the Telegraph story).

The second moment was more personal. I am a member of the Senate at the University of Northern British Columbia. On August 24th we were honoured to have a presentation given by Dr. Paulette Regan, lead writer for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and Dr. Rheanna Robinson, UNBC faculty member and senior advisor to the president on aboriginal relations, on the role of education in the path toward reconciliation with First Nations peoples in Canada.

A short description of the presentation is available on the UNBC website. There Regan is cited as saying: ""The Truth and Reconciliation Commission believes education is key to reconciliation,"....The education system must be decolonized and transformed, universities and educators play a leadership role in this process, and reconciliation begins with each and every one of us." Dr. Robinson cited a number of examples of UNBC's accomplishments and she said: "Engaging in dialogue about how we can approach teaching and research through a reconciliation lens will reveal our institutional strengths and identify gaps that inform how we respond to the TRC's calls to action in ways that can truly change minds and hearts."

I felt the profound weight of the call to be part of the reconciliation. In answer to a question about how we might take steps toward reconciliation, Regan said something to the effect that she considers each decision she makes and ask whether she is "re-colonizing or decolonizing."