Warning: This story contains details of abuse and self-harm.
Amanda Wallin calls the scars on her arms “my diploma of survival.”
Anglican elder to the bishop of Rupert’s Land and a member of Peter Ballantyne Cree Nation, Wallin was 12 years old when she cut her arms with cushion zippers at Sisters of the Good Shepherd School, a Roman Catholic-run youth facility in Winnipeg also known as Marymound. Survivors compared Marymound to residential schools in a class-action lawsuit which, among other abuses, described staff locking children in small rooms for long periods without food, water or toilets.
On June 18, Wallin attended a gifting ceremony where the Anglican Church of Canada, Presbyterian Church in Canada and United Church of Canada collectively donated $1.5 million to the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation (NCTR) in support of a new, permanent building. Each denomination contributed an equal sum of $500,000 to the NCTR, an archive for material collected by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC) related to the history and legacy of the country’s residential school system.
General Secretary Andrea Mann says the general secretary’s office approved the Anglican Church of Canada’s gift prior to her appointment in October 2025. The Anglican donation will be paid through investment income from General Synod’s Consolidated Trust Fund in five annual $100,000 instalments starting this September.
Wallin represented the Anglican Church of Canada at the gifting ceremony along with her husband Richard McKenzie—both Anglican parishioners in Winnipeg—and Mann. The ceremony took place at the University of Manitoba, which currently hosts the NCTR.
“It wasn’t because I wanted to die,” Wallin says of cutting herself when she attended Marymound from 1982 to 1986. “It was because we were locked in these little rooms … The nuns didn’t do it, but the people they hired did, and it could be up to three weeks at a time … I wanted to get out and breathe fresh air. A hospital trip was better than anything, and that behaviour [was] a way to get out of that building.”
During this time, Wallin prayed with nuns at the school. “No matter how awful it was, I still prayed with them and they kept me close to God,” she says. Remembering her experiences, Wallin speaks about the importance of forgiveness, but adds, “We have to be mindful that forgiveness is everyone’s [own] journey.”
From the 1820s to 1969, the Anglican Church administered about three dozen residential schools across Canada. The TRC in its 2015 final report called the residential school system an act of cultural genocide. Federal government policies forcibly separated Indigenous children from their families and prevented them from speaking their own languages or practicing their own cultural traditions. Many children suffered physical, sexual and emotional abuse.
During a sharing circle at the NCTR gifting ceremony, Wallin spoke about her experience as a survivor and the role of God and faith in her life. Though she attended a Roman Catholic youth home, Wallin was raised Anglican and returned to the Anglican Church afterward. She also finds support in First Nations traditions such as the sweat lodge, saying she has “one foot in the teepee and another in an Anglican church.”
“I think what the NCTR is doing is very, very significant,” Wallin says. “I’ve been to a few of their functions and I find it most powerful … We felt like we were being listened to not only by our own people, but non-Indigenous folks … It’s so important for us to be heard.”
“There’s a lot of people I see that are still hurt and broken and at a point where the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation is our only hope,” she adds. “That’s our beacon … Who do we tell? Who do we talk to? That’s [the NCTR] … It’s getting the information out.”
‘A place where the fire of reconciliation will burn forever’
In a fundraising document for its new home, the NCTR says the centre’s establishment reflected survivors’ vision “to create a place where the truths of their residential school experiences would be kept safe for future generations.” The world’s largest collection of materials on the history and impact of the residential school system, the NCTR holds more than 4 million records, including statements from survivors and other documents, representing the experiences of more than 7,000 survivors.
That collection is expanding at a rapid rate, with the NCTR having identified 23 million additional records it expects to receive in the coming months and years. Since its opening in 2015, the centre has operated primarily out of a brick house that formerly served as the residence of the university president.
“We have outgrown that home,” the NCTR says, noting that many of its materials cannot be easily viewed or accessed—being separated across several locations on the U of M campus, with many held in storage due to lack of space. The NCTR’s staff has also grown to more than 70 employees.
The University of Manitoba has donated two acres of land along the Red River to serve as the location for the NCTR’s permanent facility, which the centre estimates will cost $100 million. In November 2022, the Canadian government donated $60 million towards the project. The NCTR has launched a fundraising campaign to cover the remaining $40 million.
The NCTR says its new building will serve as a safe space for survivors to share their knowledge and experiences, for family members to heal and for all people to journey towards reconciliation based on understanding the history of residential schools. It also says the centre “will be a memorial for children who attended the schools and for those who did not return home, a place where the fire of Reconciliation will burn forever.”
Gift reflects Anglicans’ ongoing commitment to TRC Calls to Action, general secretary says
While the decision to donate to the NCTR had been made prior to Mann becoming general secretary, she says she supports the gift as an expression of the Anglican Church of Canada’s ongoing commitment to the TRC’s 94 Calls to Action—particularly Call to Action 48, which calls on church parties to the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement to adopt and comply with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as a framework for reconciliation.
The donation also supports continuation of the NCTR’s mission for reconciliation and healing beyond the church, Mann says. “It was a wonderful opportunity, a wonderful invitation for us to contribute to something more longstanding, more future-oriented and hopeful for the world far beyond the world of the church.”
In 2022, Wallin first heard about the Survivors’ Flag honouring residential school survivors. Attending Sacred Circle in 2025, she mentioned the flag to Archbishop Shane Parker, primate of the Anglican Church of Canada. The primate subsequently invited all Anglican churches to fly the Survivors’ Flag “as a sign of awareness, acknowledgement and respect for residential school survivors, their families and communities.”
Wallin says despite some pushback, she sees slow progress in the journey towards reconciliation within the church and in broader Canadian society.
“The best thing that we can do for our people and the church, I feel, is continue to educate … You’re doing one of those 94 Calls to Action by learning,” she says, adding, “We’re being heard … If we continue to move forward together … we’ll get there, God willing.”
The NCTR plans to begin construction of its permanent facility in 2027 with scheduled completion and opening in 2029.
The National Indian Residential School Crisis Line is available to support survivors and their families: 1-866-925-4419. The Hope for Wellness Helpline also offers 24/7 support for Indigenous Peoples across Canada at 1-855-242-3310 or online at hopeforwellness.ca.
If you or someone you know is thinking about self-harm or suicide, support is available 24/7 by calling or texting 988, Canada’s national suicide prevention helpline.
