September 27, 2026, Truth and Reconciliation Sunday

The Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost

A six-year-old child arrives at school wearing a bright orange shirt. By the end of the day, it is gone—and with it, part of her sense that she matters.

That child was Phyllis Webstad. When she arrived at the Mission school, she was wearing the new orange shirt her grandmother had bought for her. School authorities took it away. To them, it may have seemed like one small act among many. To Phyllis, it declared that what she loved could be taken, that where she came from did not matter, and that even her identity was not hers to keep.

That is why we wear orange. The colour carries Phyllis’s story and points to the thousands of children, families, languages, and cultures harmed by the residential school system. It bears witness to wounds that did not end when the schools closed, and it confronts us with a question we cannot leave in the past: having heard the truth, how will we respond now?

That question brings us directly to today’s Gospel. Jesus tells a story not simply about what two sons say, but about whether hearing a call leads to action. A father asks the first son to work in the vineyard. The son says no, but later changes his mind and goes. The second answers, “Yes, sir,” but never goes. Jesus asks the religious leaders, “Which of the two did the will of his father?” The answer is clear: the first.

The parable is powerful because the first son begins by refusing. He gets it wrong, but then he changes his mind. That is not always weakness; sometimes it means we have listened, learned, and allowed the truth to change us.

Truth and reconciliation ask the same of us: to learn what we did not know, hear stories we may never have heard, and recognize that much of the history many of us were taught was incomplete. We receive the testimony of Indigenous peoples not as an abstract account of long-ago events, but as the lived experience of families and communities still bearing the consequences of residential schools.

But listening must lead us to ask: What do I need to change? What do we need to change? Where must we go from here? Otherwise, we risk saying all the right things without allowing them to transform us. That is the second son: he sounds obedient, but his words and actions move in different directions.

Jesus therefore asks whether our commitment to reconciliation is something we merely say or something we do. We can wear an orange shirt without being changed, observe a day of remembrance without truly listening, and speak of reconciliation while remaining comfortable with the way things have always been. The Gospel calls us beyond words: the first son’s change of mind becomes a change of direction.

That is what repentance means. It is not guilt or endless self-condemnation, but recognizing that we are on the wrong path, turning around, and choosing another.

The reading from Philippians shows us how. Paul writes, “Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others.” Then he offers the great hymn of Christ: “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.” This is a mind willing to release privilege, listen with humility, and place the well-being of others before personal comfort. Christ does not cling to status or power; he empties himself and takes the form of a servant.

That is a vital word for reconciliation. Reconciliation is not accomplished by standing over others and deciding to fix them. It begins when we stand beside one another to listen, learn, and walk together. The image of a pathway is helpful: we do not travel it alone, and we cannot move forward by pretending the broken places are not there. I learned that lesson at the feet of the Rev. Barbara Shoomski, whom I miss keenly today. We would ordinarily be together over coffee, and I would be listening to her stories and her truth.

We cannot walk toward reconciliation without truth, and truth can be uncomfortable. It can challenge familiar stories and expose how churches, including our own Anglican Church, participated in systems that caused profound harm. That reality hit me squarely as I walked through the National Residential School Museum in Portage la Prairie. In its carefully curated rooms, I saw countless photographs and paintings of priests in black cassocks who had facilitated or condoned horrific acts against children. I felt sick to my stomach. Truth may ask us to grieve, repent, and change, but it is not the enemy of healing. Truth is where healing begins.

That is why Orange Shirt Day matters. It reminds us that children were taken from their families and communities, and it affirms that every child bears the image of God. Every child deserves to know that they are loved, that they belong, and that their language, culture, and family are gifts—not obstacles to be erased.

That affirmation must take visible form. We can support Indigenous ministries and community-led work and challenge words or assumptions that diminish Indigenous peoples. Such actions do not mean reconciliation is finished; they show that our listening is sincere and our repentance is becoming practice.

The work of reconciliation is ultimately about restoring relationships: between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples, among communities, between the Church and Indigenous peoples, and with God. The God revealed in Jesus Christ draws people together. The way of Christ is humility rather than domination, service rather than superiority, and the courage to tell the truth rather than the pretence that everything is fine. It is not simply saying, “Yes, Lord,” but allowing that yes to shape the way we live.

The first son reminds us that grace makes such change possible. Jesus does not say that we must have understood everything from the beginning. The son refuses, then turns and goes. None of us is permanently trapped by what we once believed or failed to see. God can lead us from defensiveness to honesty, from indifference to attention, and from good intentions to faithful action.

Truth and reconciliation are not the work of a single day, but the practice of a lifetime. One Orange Shirt Day, one service, one statement, or one apology cannot complete this work. We must keep returning to the stories, the truth, and the difficult questions. Whose voices are centred? Whose experiences are overlooked? Are our institutions truly changing? Above all, we ask God for the mind of Christ: humility to listen, courage to grieve, willingness to repent, and faith to keep walking when the road is long.

And so the question with which we began returns: having heard the truth, how will we respond? Let our orange shirts be more than symbols worn for a day. Let them become a promise to remember the children, honour survivors and their families, listen without defensiveness, and resist every force that tells a child their language, culture, family, or identity does not matter.

When truth overturns what we thought we knew, may we have the humility to change our minds. When repentance asks something costly of us, may we have the courage to change direction. When the road stretches long before us, may we remember that Christ has gone ahead and still walks beside us—the One who did not cling to power, but chose the way of humility, service, and love.

Amen.