HBC & Christianity

 

Everything must go! Some of us are so old (me) that we remember department stores under the Eatons and Simpsons banners. One brand that outlived these two was Hudson's Bay which recently went into receivership as well. Nearly all the stores began selling off their inventory and the remaining six may not survive either.

 When Ruth and I lived in Toronto in the late 1970s I was a seminary student working with a United Church across Bloor St. from the big Hudson's Bay store a huge distance in every way from the origins of the trading company that spread across what was to become Canada. It could be argued that without the Hudson's Bay Company Canada as a nation would never have come about. I can't recall ever making a connection between this retail story and the history of HBC. 

Full-size birch bark canoe made in Lake Savant, Ontario in the early 20th century. It can be seen on display hanging from the ceiling in the HBC Gallery. Image © Manitoba Museum 

I haven't seen much during these past few weeks about the connection between HBC and the spread of Christianity as a partner in colonization. When I looked I found an article from a couple of years ago called A Corporate Christianity: Religion in the Early Modern Hudson’s Bay Company by Tolly Bradford. It begins: 

The early modern Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) built a form of Christianity that was decidedly corporate in its design. Unlike the way Catholicism in the French fur trade was deployed to achieve imperial as well as commercial ends, Christianity in the HBC was positioned exclusively with commerce in mind. This meant it was used not to colonize Indigenous cultures or spaces but to control and protect the company’s overseas resources and support corporate relations in London. Even when this use changed in the early 1800s as baptism and religious education was offered to mixed-ancestry children of company men, the corporate agenda remained at the heart of the company’s use of religion. 

I have seen that in the discussion about the liquidization of HBC there is reference to the thousands of historical artifacts collected over the centuries. There are about 27,000 pieces now part of the Manitoba Museum with approximately two-thirds of the artifacts of First Nations, Métis, and Inuit origin.Perhaps this museum collection would be better served remaining intact, but should there be a discussion about repatriating some of these objects to First Nations and other Indigenous groups? 

I did go back to a Globe and Mail article written by Tanya Talaga a month ago in which she is insightful, as always. She writes about Rupert's Land the vast area established under British Charter 355 years ago: 

To be clear, this land was taken from the millions of Indigenous Peoples who lived on it. The Christian missionaries followed, bringing with them a belief in their right to dominate and convert, an original sin that would lead to forced attendance in Indian Residential Schools, the creation of the Indian Act and the othering of Indigenous Peoples.

Some Christian denominations, including the United Church, have acknowledged their sin of complicity with governments in Residential Schools and have begun the process of reconciliation. We can hope that the broader discussion continues with the dissolution of the Hudson's Bay corporation. We can't take an "everything must go" attitude toward the background of European expansion and colonization  in North America with all its costs for Indigenous peoples.