“If we aren't in the same space it is difficult to build relationships.”
In our first episode, Tara Anderson discusses her understanding of reconciliation and how it has evolved over time. Since 2015, Tara’s understanding of reconciliation shifted from a biblical definition to a broader secular awareness. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s summary propelled her to become engaged in her local community by exploring a deeper understanding of Indigenous history and culture.
Tara speaks about embracing awkward questions. She highlights the important first steps to understanding reconciliation – educate ourselves, find mentors who can walk with us, and show up to places where we will meet new people. “If we aren't in the same space it is difficult to build relationships,” Tara states, encouraging her audience to take action.
We invited Tara into our house and around our dining room table to have a conversation around these five questions:
1. How would you define reconciliation?
2. What experiences have defined this understanding?
3. Where have you seen grace in the reconciliation journey?
4. How would you invite other people into understanding reconciliation?
5. Why is reconciliation important to you?
Then we recorded her reflections.
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Links from the episode:
Office of the Treaty Commission
Kairos Blanket Exercise
Truth and Reconciliation Final Report
Mennonite Central Committee Saskatchewan
Reconcile: Everyday Conversations is a project of Mennonite Central Committee Saskatchewan aimed at facilitating conversations among settler/non-Indigenous Canadians around our role in reconciliation.
Project Coordinator: Heather Peters
Recording and Editing: Joel Kroeker
Music by A Northern Road to Glory