"History can provide us with painful, though necessary, lessons that will help us come to better understand why the dominant religious cultures of North America have often failed tragically to listen with a nonpatronizing and open heart and mind to the story of Native Americans. Well-written history can bring us to our senses. Fr. Vincent J. McNallly, professor of church history at Sacred Heart School of Theology, near Milwaukee, offers such history. It is a strongly critical but generally objective account of a missionary order's long-term relationship with the Native people of British Columbia....His account, however, is prototypical of the missionary story in many other places. Its lessons are timely and serve to illuminate a wide ecumenical audience....Many remain in denial, even today, of the truth and the serious damage that actually resulted. It is clear that McNally has an honorable and constructive purpose. He strongly affirms Christian faith and evangelization. Yet, he believes Christians must come to terms with their missionary history. The church needs to own its mistakes, learn from them and undertake reconcilation, renewal and healing with those who were so often misunderstood and hurt. McNally's book provides...an important and serious wake-up call...To read this book is to be confronted with a reality, shorn of propaganda and pious sentiment, that is both a bitter pill and a harbinger of hope....Pope John Paul recently reminded all Catholics that "grave forms of injustice" have been done in the church's past in the name of the gospel of Jesus Christ....Bigotry and hate, narrowness and intolerance, have more often been reflected in the missions than a gospel message of radical inclusiveness. The gospel, not the institutional church, is central to the Christian message. It is time to make amends and to begin anew." Reviewed by The Rev. Wayne A. Holst, lecturer in religion and culture at the University of Calgary in the "National Catholic Reporter" Sping Books section, February 2, 2001, p. 38.

Comprehensive, candid and critical-McNally's coverage of Catholic Missions and churches in British Columbia is both insightful and wide-ranging. His treatment of the motives, methods, and impact of the missionaries' residential schools on First Nations children and communities is especially good.

Review by (back cover of book) by J.R. Miller, History, University of Saskatchewan

"McNally's study is thorough, balanced and professionally critical: a spendid addition to our accumulating knowledge of the Irish Catholic Church." E.R. Norman, Peterhouse, Cambridge University. The Journal of Ecclesiastical History, Vol. 40, no. 1, pp. 185-86.