Early on during the settlement of North America missionaries, particularly Jesuit ones, would regularly travel around to indigenous populations in an attempt to get them to convert to their religions. This had a very clear negative impact on the indigenous populations as it could cause conflict both between the peoples themselves and with the missionaries. European beliefs and values did not generally sit well with the natives and therefore the missionaries were not particularly successful. Although not directly related, these early attempts to push religion on indigenous peoples reminds me of the later advent of residential schools. Though this didn’t happen until after confederation, it does show an early and clear intent from European settlers to coerce or force indigenous peoples to follow their religions.

Reading Log 2: Missionaries and Indigenous Peoples