Podcast: Listen in on the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation

Do something.

That’s the message this year from Downie Wenjack Fund, which produces the annual ‘A Day to Listen’ radio program heard on stations across the country.

That includes on Big Country 93.1 and 989 REWIND Radio in Grande Prairie.

But what can one do if they can’t change the past?

There’s lots actually (like attending the Reconciliaction event Tuesday), but Donna Bishop, kokum and elder at Red Deer Native Friendship Society, in a recent interview with rdnewsNOW and The Everything Red Deer Podcast, harkened back to the words of the late Justice Murray Sinclair.

“Take a moment like you would on Remembrance Day. A moment of silence. Commemorate in whatever way you can,” Bishop says. “Just never forget those kids.”

What was it Justice Sinclair said exactly?

Donna Bishop (second from left), with other community members, including Red Deer Native Friendship Centre executive director Nadette Agecoutay (left) at a community Blanket Exercise event on Friday, Sept. 26 in Red Deer. (rdnewsNOW/Josh Hall)

In response to people asking why Indigenous people can’t just ‘get over’ the traumas of the past…

“My answer has always been: Why can’t you always remember this? Because this is about memorializing those people who have been the victims of a great wrong. Why don’t you tell the United States to ‘get over’ 9/11? Why don’t you tell this country to ‘get over’ all the veterans who died in the Second World War, instead of honouring them once a year?” Sinclair, who died in November 2024, told the CBC in 2017.

“I was adopted by a beautiful Ukrainian family in 1961. I don’t have to [spell out] the timeframe, you do the math,” Bishop shared about her upbringing.

Bishop and her colleagues at the friendship centre put on a day-long workshop last Friday which featured a Blanket Exercise, and an afternoon spent tea

Two attendees of a World Rivers Day event walk down to the Red Deer River to collect a pail of water on Sept. 28, 2025. (rdnewsNOW/Josh Hall)

“In it, we talk about about Treaty 6, Treaty 7, and Metis territory. We pay homage and we concentrate on telling those stories about residential school, the Sixties Scoop, and other factual information,” said Bishop.

“But we do it in a loving way so that nobody walks away with their vulnerabilities. We are there to help walk them through anything that might’ve been uncomfortable.”

Discomfort is a natural part of the process, she says, but it doesn’t have to end there.

“We wouldn’t want to leave them in the way we were left,” she added. “Two wrongs don’t make a right.”

Over at Fort Normandeau on Sunday, where work has been done the last few years to refine and more accurately portray the history told in the exhibit there, community members came together to mark World Rivers Day.

The event was primarily organized by the Red Deer Indigenous Dance Troupe, whose community coordinator is Aaren Howse.

Howse spoke about how to Indigenous people, water represents life, and that people far too often take it for granted.

She also spoke of her mother, who didn’t survive long after being involved in the Sixties Scoop.

“I’m grateful that we are moving forward, but is it fast enough? I really don’t think so. If [reconciliation] was

What's Happening

Chile holds an election that could deliver its most right-wing president since dictatorship

11m ago

US envoys arrive in Berlin for another round of Ukraine peace talks

1h ago

Gunmen kill 9 people at Sydney's Bondi Beach with 1 shooter dead and another arrested

1h ago

Morgan Frost scores in OT to lift the Flames past the Kings, 2-1

4h ago

Morgan Frost scores in OT to lift Flames past the Kings 2-1

4h ago

“But I’m just so grateful to be able to live for her, for my ancestors. Instead of allowing it to be darkness, I’m sharing our culture because we grew up not being allowed to share our culture. We were told to be quiet because the white people might get you.”

Howse added that practising her culture saved her life.

“I’m so happy my kids live in a world where you don’t necessarily have to be ashamed to be Indigenous.”

Aaren Howse, community coordinator with the Red Deer Indigenous Dance Troupe, helped lead a World Rivers Day event at Fort Normandeau on Sept. 28, 2025. (rdnewsNOW/Josh Hall)

—

Though told respectfully, we acknowledge these stories can be retraumatizing. If you are Indigenous and need help, you can call the national Hope for Wellness Helpline, which is available 24/7, 7 days a week, at 1-855-242-3310.

Hear more of our conversations with Donna Bishop, Aaren Howse, Lianne Hazell, and much more, including a selection from the ‘A Day to Listen’ catalogue, on the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation edition of The Everything Red Deer Podcast.

by Josh Hall | @Vancan19