​November 2016 The Province of Ontario has proclaimed the first complete week in November Treaties Recognition Week “to bring awareness to the treaty relationships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people in the province.”

As Anglicans and Lutherans who seek to find healing and reconciliation in our churches’ relationships with Indigenous peoples and each other we welcome this initiative. Treaties Recognition Week encourages communities and individuals to observe a time of discernment toward change and honouring of our place in history with a necessary eye to the future.

The Greek words “chronos” and “kairos” offer two different meanings for time. Chronos refers to the time that one can measure, while kairos means an ultimately God-given moment in time. The right, divine moment to be inspired, act, or speak. The concept of time as kairos is intensely personalized because no one else can take charge of it on your behalf. Kairos is yours alone and the summons it presents is yours only. No one else can live if for you.

This little booklet is presented to us in this same spirit. Retired Lutheran pastor Peter Mogk authored seven reflections for our daily devotion during Treaties Recognition Week. Peter offers helpful insight into the history and meaning of treaties and invites us to reflect upon both in light of the biblical message of God’s call for peace, justice, reconciliation, and healing.

So here we are in the chronos or calendar time of Treaties Recognition Week. As we read the following pages, one for each day, we will recognize that we are living in the kairos time of discernment and response. May God bless our individual and communal journeys through Treaties Recognition Week in many ways!

The Lutheran and Anglican congregations of the Bay Ministry Area and the Waterloo and BrantNorfolk Deaneries will also observe Treaties Recognition Week with a Blanket Exercise (Wednesday, November 9) and an afternoon of learning and worship at the Woodland Cultural Centre and Her Majesty’s Royal Chapel of the Mohawks (Sunday, November 13).

For more Information please contact:
​Rev. Thomas Mertz, St. John’s Lutheran Church, Hamilton (905-527-6611)
Rev. Dr. Tim Dobbin, St. Mark’s Anglican Church, Brantford (519-752-6451)
For the Anglican-Lutheran working group for Treaties Recognition Week.