I really thought we were done with this evil, yet it persists.On October 1, All Saints Orthodox Church in Meadow Lake, Saskatchewan, was destroyed in what is likely another in a series of church arsons occurring across Canada.The dramatic increase in church arsons in Canada is clearly connected with the incendiary announcement made by the Kamloops Indian Band in May 2021. The Band claimed it had “confirmation of the remains of 215 children who were students of the Kamloops Indian Residential School.” Although some assume all those responsible for the church arsons are therefore indigenous people angry over the Kamloops claim, newer evidence is pointing in additional, equally unsettling directions. Importantly, the statistical work of Edgardo Sepulveda of the MacDonald-Laurier Institute shows the increased frequency of arson of Christian churches actually began years before the Kamloops announcement. Sepulveda suggests this earlier, smaller increase was related to a change in the perception of what Indian Residential Schools (IRS) were. Perception of IRS slowly changed across the country after the release of the final report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in December 2015.And now, over five years after the announcement of the “remains of 215 children” at Kamloops, during which time not a single one of the 215 geophysical anomalies has been proven to be human remains, the criminal acts against Christian churches continue. For the sake of simplicity, I will deal exclusively in this article with arson and attempted arson against churches (and not vandalism). The arsons and attempted arsons total 70 so far, if we include All Saints Orthodox Church from October and exclude those arsons which occurred before the Kamloops announcement.I spent several days compiling the data on these 70 arsons and poring over them to try to identify any trends that might help us further answer the difficult questions of “who” committed these arsons and “why.” Of these 70, there were just 16 times when the police charged a person or persons with arson, and even fewer times when those charges led to a conviction..While it’s easy to blame police for the apparent lack of convictions, their solve rate for these arsons is within normal parameters. Arsons have an abysmal 16% clearance rate in Canada, leaving authorities loath to prosecute them without an abundance of evidence, which often goes up in smoke. Additionally, those found guilty of arson have no obligation to explain their motivation, and that leaves the public with more questions than answers. But we do have some crime data to go over, thanks to the investigative efforts of independent journalists. The data reveals that several of those charged with arson of churches were from Indian reserves, such as Sandy White (23), Lazare Favel (26), and an unidentified youth, all from Saddle Lake, Alberta. They allegedly burned down All Saints Ukrainian Church in Bellis, Alberta, on September 21, 2025. According to a churchgoer I discussed the matter with, Favel pleaded guilty to break and enter, possession of stolen property, and resisting arrest. White and the unidentified youth are awaiting trial, and a fourth person is being sought for questioning.The most obvious trend to notice in the initial 2021 arsons was the precision in their targeting. The targeted churches were predominantly Roman Catholic and located in BC, on or very near an Indian reserve. In total, seven Roman Catholic churches were razed to the ground, while there was also one Anglican and one United church destroyed in 2021. The proportions somewhat reflected those churches’ participation in the IRS system.But after a slowdown in 2022, church arsons returned to an accelerated rate. Sepulveda believes that the resurgence was related to subsequent announcements of “unmarked graves” by other First Nations, including in June 2021, January 2022, May 2022, January 2023, June 2023, and January 2025.In each case, as you can verify using the links above, the CBC was all over the story.But the CBC, just like many others, immediately treats these announcements like facts instead of questioning them. They don’t put them into context either. It’s actually entirely likely that there are unmarked graves near many IRS because we know that many children did die away from home and were buried at school. Why did so many die in IRS?.Throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, tuberculosis was a rampant killer of kids in all walks of life — especially indigenous children, both on reserves and at schools — and a vaccine was not broadly available in Canada until 1948. Antibiotics came in during the 1950s and 1960s. That’s very close to or after the closing of many IRS. Are these children “missing” or victims of a “genocide”?Many graves of children were marked with wooden crosses because the schools did not have funding for more permanent monuments. Those crosses were often destroyed by wildfire, pushed aside without proper regard for their meaning, or destroyed over time. That doesn’t make the buried intentionally missing or victims of a genocide. It makes the burial sites worth confirming and properly re-marking. That’s a good goal, but it has occurred in very few instances. But, almost ignoring any historical context, the arsons continue in 2026.Why are some people still not putting this issue into context?Some of the “newer” church arsonists appear to be pyromaniacs in it for the act of evil itself. Such was the case with Gerrid Perret (49) of Penticton, BC. Perret allegedly torched both St. Stephen’s Anglican Church and a nearby high school in Summerland, BC, over the same weekend in February 2024. Another example is Lesley Cleave (49) of no fixed address, who was caught allegedly attempting to burn down Saint Paul’s Presbyterian Church in Hamilton, Ontario, on New Year’s Eve 2022. Cleave had been arrested earlier that year by the York Regional Police for a string of arsons in Newmarket, Ontario.But if you wish to know if there are still those that are in it for the act of revenge, then look no further than the recent reporting of Rebel News. Both owner Ezra Levant and journalist Alexa Lavoie recently went to investigate the remains of St. Simon church, which burned to the ground on August 24, 2026, in the small Acadian town of St. Simon, New Brunswick. There they learned from locals about the background of the alleged arsonist, Gilles Mallet (68) of St. Simon, now in custody. Mallet and his family were intimately involved with the now-destroyed St. Simon church, and his relatives are having a very hard time processing that he’s accused of burning it down. It was apparently Mallet’s sister who turned him in to the RCMP when she saw he had recorded the alleged incident as a tribute to an indigenous activist named Stacy Gallagher, whom he calls out repeatedly in his recording. Mallet’s sister revealed to Rebel News that he suffered from past psychotic episodes due to heavy marijuana use, and this was possibly aggravated when he moved to Vancouver, BC, and participated in a healing lodge where he used psychedelics with other indigenous activists. Mallet recorded himself within St. Simon church two days before he allegedly destroyed it, and he seems as if he’s on another plane of existence in the footage.“This Sunday, August 22, 2026,” he says through laboured breaths (translated from Acadian). “It will be the last time I enter the church. And to my parishioners, the parishioners of St. Simon, I have something for you. There is a truth that needs to come out. I love you all. And forgive me, or forgive them, for they know not what they are doing.”I thought we were done with this evil, but perhaps it’s not done with us.
