“INDIAN RESIDENTIAL SCHOOL AND CHRISTIAN MISSION”
During the colonial period, prompted by the expansion ambitions of Western Europe, the system represented by the rapid assimilation of colonies and the policy of Christianization was the Indian Residential School. At the same time, the primary framework of racial thinking of Western Europeans was influenced by social Darwinism and influenced background on the basis of Christian missionary policy and practice. Most Indian Residential Schools were run by Christian denominations or churches that had been allocated government funds. The Indigenous students who went to residential school first came across Christianity there. Also, Christian religious education was an important part of the school curriculum. However, the Christianization of students through residential schools resulted in mixed outcomes, contrary to the expectations of the missionary policy of boarding schools. The discussions in this study are to study the impact of the Indian Residential School in the formation of a Christian understanding among the Nuu-chah-nulth people. The primary question addressed is ‘How do historical encounter and experience from colonial residential school influence their understanding of Christianity?’ Since its first establishment in the mid-1800s, Indigenous peoples in Canada attended residential schools over a hundred years, and their Christian identities were formed and influenced by their experience of their residential schools.
[1] Herbert Spencer, 1820-1903
