Story highlighted below by Tyler Olsen and Grace Kennedy| November 17, 2021

Photo above: Sumas Lake was at the centre of Fraser Valley life for thousands of years, before it was drained a century ago. The Reach Gallery Archives/Image: P188

A Maori Lord's Prayer

Our province of British Columbia Canada since November 14 has been undergoing a massive emergency, due to unprecedented rainfall that led to gigantic mudslides, road washouts, flooding, and death. Worst hit in the Fraser Valley below where we live is the Sumas Prairie of the City of Abbotsford.

It is an overwhelming tragedy for lives lost and livelihoods ruined. One can scarcely imagine the scope. Our hearts go out to those affected by such wrenching devastation.

As with other major disasters, the rising to the challenging needs of neighbour and stranger by innumerable officials and volunteers is wonderfully heartwarming and immensely uplifting. There are and will be endless accounts of heroism, compassion, empathy, etc. We're all reading about, watching, prizing this superb outpouring of community-coming-together everywhere hard hit.

What follows was occasioned by the Deluge, but not about the above.

The Tragedy and the Travesty

"They took the lake away and we never got one inch of it,” former Grand Chief Lester Ned told the Vancouver Sun in 2013. “I don’t know how the people survived way back then.” Chief Ned died in October.

This overwhelming tragedy today points to an overwhelming travesty committed a century ago against thousands who had peopled the Sumas Lake area: a Lake that was drained under the noses of–in stark terms, stolen from–the Sumas First Nation.

The current horrific events cast an eerie spotlight on a century-old gargantuan injustice committed by White Settlers. There is no gentle way to state it. Calling it an injustice, a blandly inadequate term, or property theft according to the Criminal Code of Canada, are the only legitimate labels for such an incalculably grotesque high crime.

Should not the sheer pathos of that simple comment send chills down our spines? ((We read in Sumas First Nation built on higher ground, unaffected by flooding in former lake bed, says chief, by Michelle Gomez, November 19, 2021:

The lake also used to be their primary food source, according to [Sumas First Nation Chief Dalton Silver], and their ancestors told government officials in the early 20th century that draining the river would cause starvation for the Sumas people.

"It is something that our people never would have even thought of doing, altering nature in such a way."

Ultimately, the lake was drained between 1920 and 1924.

A few points before proceeding:

• Morally: All crime cries out for confession, repentance, commitment to "never again," and amends-making on the part of the perpetrator(s) and/or beneficiar(y)ies. Biblically, this is called justice-making. I've spent a career working on it, writing about it, puzzling over it.
• There is never a "right time" to raise this issue. Some said to me though in mid-November, "This is the wrong time." I ask simply: If not now, when? If not now, why? We humans have enormously short attention spans, especially when it serves our purposes. However, I did put this reflection on hold for three weeks.
• Some claim there is a kind of "Statute of Limitation" at play here. I ask: Morally, is there ever a Statute of Limitation for such an horrific wrong?
• Commitment to Truth, Justice and Compassion (as in the Maori prayer above) starts with connecting dots. If this, then that . . .

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