Healing Forests
Forests have a healing, spiritual, calming, and nurturing effect on people. The National Healing Forests Initiative is an invitation to Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities, institutions, and individuals to create green spaces throughout Canada to honour residential school victims, survivors, and their families, as well as murdered and missing Indigenous women and girls, and children who have been or were removed from their families (including during the Sixties Scoop).
The goal is for communities and individuals to work together to create a Healing Forest, whether within urban parks or in rural settings. It might include outdoor gathering spaces, walking trails, and plots dedicated to growing sacred plants and trees. Visiting Elders might present stories, and survivors and their families share their experiences. Each community decides for themselves what their Healing Forest looks like and how it will function. The only proviso is that the Healing Forest is created and used in the spirit of reconciliation, healing, shared understanding and respect.
https://www.nationalhealingforests.ca/about
https://www.nationalhealingforests.ca/
There are Healing Forests in British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec and the Atlantic Provinces.
Here is a list of some of the Healing Forest Locations in Ontario:
- Misiwe Ni Relations Healing Forest in Manotick, established in 2018
- Perth Healing Forest in Perth, established in 2018
- All Saints Healing Forest in Ottawa, established in 2019
- Noojimo’iwewin Gitigaan Healing Forest in Toronto, established in 2021
- Indigenous Community & Healing Garden at Ajax Pickering Hospital in Ajax, established in 2022
- Eagle Lake Farabout Peninsula Healing Forest, in Farabout Peninsula, established in 2022
- Central Manitoulin Wellness Orchard at Central Manitoulin Public School, in Mindemoya, established in 2023
- Northlea United Healing Forest at Northlea United Church in Toronto, established in 2023
- University of Waterloo Healing Forest in Waterloo, established in 2024
- Birch Path Healing Forest, Just Food Community Farm in Gloucester, established in 2024
- Niigaan maamqiying (Moving Forward Together) Healing Forest in Burlington, established in 2025
- Noojimo Mitigwaaki (Healing Forest) in Collingwood, established in 2025
- M’Wikwedong Indigenous Friendship Centre Healing Forest in Owen Sound
- Indigenous Community & Healing Garden in Toronto
- Dish With One Spoon Healing Gardens and Forests in Guelph
- Bruce Trail Conservancy’s Indigenous Healing Gardens, established in 2023
