Vatican returns to Canada artefacts connected to Indigenous people

Pope Leo gifts the objects to the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops following a meeting with its representatives including its president

Pope Francis meets with First Nations, Metis and Inuit indigenous communities in Maskwacis, Alberta, Canada Jul 25, 2022. Picture taken Jul 25, 2022. REUTERS/Guglielmo Mangiapane

The Vatican on Saturday returned 62 artefacts connected to the Indigenous peoples of Canada to the country's Catholic bishops, offering what it called "a concrete sign of dialogue, respect and fraternity", a statement said.

Pope Leo gifted the objects to the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops following a meeting with its representatives including its president, Bishop Pierre Goudreault.

"The CCCB will proceed, as soon as possible, to transfer these artefacts to the National Indigenous Organisations (NIOs). The NIOs will then ensure that the artefacts are reunited with their communities of origin," the Canadian bishops said.

Catholic missionaries sent the artefacts to Rome on the occasion of a 1925 exhibition held by Pope Pius XI that displayed more than 100,000 objects. Nearly half of them later formed a new Missionary Ethnological Museum and were transferred to the Vatican Museums in the 1970s.

In 2022, the late Pope Francis issued a historic apology to Canada's Indigenous peoples ahead of his visit to the country for the Catholic Church's role in residential schools where many children suffered abuse and were buried in unmarked graves.

The repatriation of the native artefacts held at the Vatican Museums was also part of the talks between the Church and the Indigenous leaders.

Anita Anand, the foreign minister of Canada, welcomed the Vatican's move.

"This is an important step that honours the diverse cultural heritage of Indigenous peoples and supports ongoing efforts toward truth, justice, and reconciliation," she wrote on X.