A spree of church arsons have occurred across Canada. In less than two weeks, seven churches have burned following the discovery of over 1,000 unmarked graves on the land of former boarding schools for Indigenous assimilation. The term “cultural genocide” has been used to describe the treatment of Indigenous children from the 1880s to the 1990s throughout Canada. Over 110 years, roughly 150,000 Indigenous children were sent to boarding schools to be stripped of their language and culture, facing horrific emotional, physical and sexual abuse in the process, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission reports [via BBC]. At least 130 of these schools -- many run by the Catholic Church -- were open throughout Canada until as late as 1996. It’s estimated that up to 6,000 neglected children died of malnutrition and disease at these residential schools, though the true number may never be known as many records were destroyed.