Update on Pond Inlet, Nunavut

Pond Inlet, Nunavut, is still referred to as "the jewel of the Baffin Island."

By the mid 1800`s in this area near Pond Inlet, as trade began with Scottish whalers and explorers, items like rifles, steel knives, pots and pans, sewing needles, tobacco and tea were gradually introduced into the Inuit culture. Some of these items were of benefit to the Inuit, but negative effects from contact with the Europeans included the spread of diseases, plus the fact that Inuit women were often used for sexual purposes by the whalers in exchange for things like tobacco, and the children produced by these relationships were left without fathers, and encountered an identity crisis.
Furthermore, while the Inuit had never overhunted, the whalers drastically overhunted the bowhead whale in particular, and then it was the Inuit who got stuck with federal government quotas for many years to come.

In fact, it is estimated that the Scottish whalers killed over 18,000 bowhead whales in the Baffin region between the years 1820 to 1860 alone.

This picture of Pond Inlet was taken in the 1920`s, and since this time, and even before, since the early 1900`s, there has not been one bowhead whale caught in the vicinity of Pond Inlet for over 100 years!

This is the site of the original Scottish whaling station which is located about eight miles from present-day Pond Inlet. On August 4, 2009, some 50 community leaders and residents from Pond Inlet travelled by boat to this site to engage in a healing the land process. Among those participating in the ceremony were Iain and Susan Wilson from Scotland. They repented on behalf of their ancestors, the Scottish whalers, and the leading elder of the community, who told the story of what happened here, released forgiveness, and Communion was shared between the Scottish, the Inuit and the land.

It has been a year since this healing the land ceremony took place near Pond Inlet where the Scottish whalers had their station. It is quite significant that in this year of 2010, during the very week that this healing ceremony took place in 2009, that the hunters of Pond Inlet caught their first bowhead whale in over 100 years! This is a tremendous boost to the community, and the jubiliation on the face of the hunters is evident.

I am writing this from Cape Dorset, Nunavut, which is undergoing a healing the land process during this week of August 10-17, 2010, and I was just told this morning by one of the community leaders here that he was told by the captain of this whaling hunt in Pond Inlet that when the bowhead whale was brought to shore, the many, many Arctic Char fish came right up on shore as well, and were jumping out of the water, and were so accessible that people could catch them with their bare hands.

This is surely a sign of God`s blessing upon the community of Pond Inlet!