National Indigenous Anglican Archbishop Chris Harper said that in the languages of the Plains Cree, Swampy Cree and Woods Cree as well as those of several other Indigenous peoples, the word for northern lights translates to English as "dancing spirits," which he said illustrates both an image of the peoples’ ancestors being present with them and the parallels between that image and Paul’s description of the saints as a “great cloud of witnesses.” Photo: Smit/Shutterstock
After a vote with no objections at its 2024 synod, May 26-28, the ecclesiastical province formerly known as Rupert’s Land will become officially known as the Province of the Northern Lights beginning June 1. The name is designed to better reflect the perspectives and influence of the numerous nations and groups of Indigenous people who live within the province’s area, according to the provincial metropolitan, Archbishop Greg Kerr-Wilson. He says the new name will go into use immediately in common usage, while the province’s chancellors, specialists in church and secular law, are working changing it on official church and government documents. He also confirmed the diocese would be commissioning new graphic design materials with the name, including a possible redesign of the province’s official crest.
The old name is a holdover from the name given to a vast swath of what is now Canada, named for the first governor of the Hudson’s Bay Company, Prince Rupert of the Rhine (1619-1682), who was also a grandson of King James I. Kerr-Wilson described the name Rupert’s Land as “about as colonial as it gets,” dating from a time that saw “a bunch of guys from England showing up and claiming a big chunk of land as their own without paying any attention whatsoever to the people living there.” The new name, he said, has deep significance to people across the province, which is by far the largest of the Anglican Church of Canada’s four ecclesiastical provinces, spanning the three civil Prairie provinces, northern Quebec and most of the Canadian Arctic. The northern lights are visible from every region in the province at some time of year, he said.
Speaking to the Anglican Journal at the Council of General Synod, meeting May 31-June 2, National Indigenous Archbishop Chris Harper, who was present for the vote, said the change was a meaningful step toward reconciliation in the Anglican Church of Canada. It was part of a journey, he said “to make it something that is more embracing and welcoming, inclusive to all peoples, all nations.” In the end, he said, the decision came down to the province listening and respecting the endorsement of the Indigenous representatives there. “That’s one of the reasons they felt incredibly honoured to be included in the conversation and heavily consulted in this,” he said.
During the early part of the COVID-19 pandemic, lockdowns slowed down church operations and gave church leaders more time to think deeply about the institution and its structures, Kerr-Wilson said. He had a conversation with then-National Indigenous Archbishop Mark MacDonald in which the two agreed to investigate a name change and kicked off a series of consultations by Zoom with the province’s Indigenous bishops over the following two years.
The Province of the Northern Lights was one of two finalists that emerged from that process, which were brought forward by the Indigenous bishops for consideration at the provincial synod. The other was the Province of Auroramiut, or “People of the place of the Northern Lights,” from the Latin phrase “aurora borealis” and an Inuktitut suffix meaning “people of.” The names were first discussed at the province’s 2022 synod, but the final decision was not made until the 2024 meeting this May.
In that discussion, members suggested changes and other options, such as The Province of Living Waters or the Province of the People of the Northern lights. But in the end, Kerr-Wilson said, a group of Indigenous representative said t the northern lights were spiritually significant to many Indigenous peoples across North America, representing in some cases the presence of their ancestors. For that reason, he said, they endorsed the name Province of the Northern Lights, which won the final vote with no hands raised against it.
Harper added that in the languages of the Plains Cree, Swampy Cree and Woods Cree as well as those of several other Indigenous peoples, the word for northern lights translates to English as “dancing spirits,” which he said illustrates both an image of the peoples’ ancestors being present with them and the parallels between that image and Paul’s description of the saints as a “great cloud of witnesses.”
“I think that’s probably the best way,” he said, “to see Paul’s words in that [image] about being an ambassador of a great cloud of witnesses going before us—but also to see the beauty and glory of God’s creation, to see that energy coming in from the sun and how it comes through the magnetic pole and how it shifts into something we can see with our eyes … God is saying, ‘See, this is something beautiful.’ ”
Archbishop Linda Nicholls, primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, attended the province’s synod. She held up the name change in her primatial address at a May 31 session of the Council of General Synod, to cheers from the floor.
“It was wonderful to be there for that conversation,” she said, “as they thought about a name that would represent the geography and people and experience of that part of our country. That name seemed to capture hearts and minds not only because of the physical nature of the northern lights but because of the metaphorical nature of being the light of Christ.”