For the past two years, Untethered Heart Counselling owner Cindy Rendall has led Truth and Reconciliation Week programmes for non-Indigenous individuals throughout the city of Lethbridge.
Many people, Rendall remarked, “were like me.” “You have some knowledge, and you believe that you are doing well because you attended Sisters and Spirit Vigil… However, there is actually a lot more we can do and knowledge we need to seek out.
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She establishes a forum for free discussion of cultural awareness and unconscious biases in her course, “Reconciliation Starts with You!” Rendall walks her students through the history of colonisation and the structures that benefited settlers at the expense of indigenous peoples.
It’s difficult to consider reconciliation. It’s not easy to look at our history or to look at white privilege, or systemic racism,” said Rendall.
The City of Lethbridge began giving Rendall’s course after learning the community want additional information, according to Echo Nowak, Indigenous relations consultant for the City of Lethbridge.
“The history and stuff that we don’t actually learn in a history book” were both major topics of Cindy’s lecture, according to Nowak.
Being an ally, according to Rendall, is being uneasy, asking questions, standing up for Indigenous people, and realising that everyone is on a different route to reconciliation.
“We also need to be accountable for asking ourselves, ‘How do I navigate in my world knowing what I know? When should I defend injustice? What hours will I work on trying to alter the system? How do I carry out such actions? stated Rendall.
Nowak asserts that dialogue about reconciliation is occurring.
“Indigenous people are aware that people desire to learn. Don’t be afraid to inquire because we want to share our history and our narrative with you and we want to teach you,” Nowak advised.
On her website, Rendall offers workshops that can be reserved.
Lethbridge reconciliation programme for allies who are not Indigenous: “Much more we can do”
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