Smithville Christian High School: Why do we wear orange in September?

Wearing an orange shirt is a way of acknowledging the harm done to the thousands of students who attended Residential Schools in Canada, students of Smithville Christian High School were told at a September chapel.

In preparation for September 30, National Day of Truth and Reconciliation, when students and staff are invited to wear orange shirts, Crystal Lavallee, founder and national director of I Am Compelled, who is of Métis descent, spoke at a recent chapel. Lavallee said her mission is to help tell the stories of people whose lives were and are affected by the harm done to them and their ancestors.

As Canadians are invited to consider how they can be part of the reconciliation story in this country, our hearts can be transformed by hearing the stories of pain, hurt, and suffering, she said.

“Thousands of people hate Christians because of what was done to them in the name of God,” Lavallee told students, referencing the decades of harm done to Indigenous, Inuit, and Métis children in institutions run by various church organizations. “That’s why, as Christians, we have a responsibility to help bring healing,” she said, inviting students to say the Lord’s Prayer with her, and emphasizing the forgiveness of debts that Christ makes possible for us to offer and receive.

Lavallee said she spent some time in the Frog Lake community in Treaty 6 territory, hearing the stories of residential school survivors. One man said he doesn’t hate white people, but he “hates what they did to me.” Lavallee asked him how he got free, and he said it was due to the “power of forgiveness.”

Lavellee shared a film from that community called Frog Lake: The Untold Stories.

“My prayer is that it will transform your heart.”