Atonement Home Demolished
Memories still haunt many who stayed there as children
KATE QUINN & PAULA E. KIRMAN
This article was previously published in the February-March 2025 edition of Boyle McCauley News.
Juanita Murphy was always haunted by bad memories when she passed the Atonement Home on 92 Street and 110 Avenue on her way to medical appointments. December 20 was different. The building was being demolished. Old wounds ripped open as she could see into the bowels of the structure.
“I suffered various forms of abuse at the hands of nuns and priests, all in the name of ‘God’,” she recalls. “I am grateful that it’s over, and my inner child is safe. I am glad to see it go, but the memories will always linger.”
Atonement Home was a Catholic boarding school opened by the Franciscan Sisters of the Atonement in 1928. It became a temporary residence for children aged 3 to 12 while they awaited either return to their families or placement in foster care. It closed as a children’s residence in 1988.
Atonement Home was not added to the list of residential schools recognized by the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement because it was not federally funded. Alberta Children’s Services was responsible for placing children there.
After 1988, the Franciscan Sisters Benevolent Society operated a number of programs, including a day care and Head Start program. The building later became known as the Franciscan Centre.
Catholic Social Services acquired the land in 2024 with plans to expand housing supports for vulnerable Albertans.
The demolition came as a surprise to many in McCauley and beyond. On December 28, activists April Eve Wiberg and Stephanie Harpe organized a “flash rally” at the site for survivors, their children, and supporters. Stephanie was 10 when she and her brother were taken to the Atonement Home. “As they break this place and as it crumbles, I let it do that to me for a short while but I took back my healing, I took back my power. I took back my place. I ignited my home fire, my spirit,” she said.
“I choose not to be that rubble. Today I take back that hurt. Today I take back my spirit, and that’s all that matters. It’s a beautiful, powerful day.”
Clinton Marty spent seven years at Atonement Home. “We were all children, innocent children," he said.
"There is a lot of hidden history here . . . to bring light in any form is necessary for people to wake up and see what happened. There’s neighbours here who never knew what happened in this building. The memories will live with me. My children and grandchildren will always remember to tell the stories of abuse.”
April Eve Wiberg’s siblings spent time at Atonement Home. She said, “I’ve seen the lifelong harm. It ends here with us. We have to get these stories out.”
Catholic Social Services provided an email statement to Boyle McCauley News explaining it did not make a public statement in order to protect the safety and security of clients and staff in nearby programs. The transfer of the property was marked in a gathering with an Elder and CSS staff where the Elder guided reflection on the aspirations for vulnerable Albertans who will be served by the new facility. CSS envisions the new building as a vital community resource, providing 33 suites and access to wraparound services.
Kate Quinn lives in McCauley, a few blocks from the former Atonement Home. She is one of many neighbours who did not know what happened inside until she and Juanita Murphy worked together at CEASE (Centre to Empower All Survivors of Exploitation and Trafficking).
Paula E. Kirman is the Editor of Boyle McCauley News.
I grew up on 110a avenue; and am a bit biased in my comments, as my Italian immigrant grandmother worked as a cleaning lady there & my parents volunteered there. I am also a former Fort Edmonton Park staff member; and am more than saddened to see any old building gone.
I know this TRUTH is gonna cause a lot of feelings; so please have be respectful & truthful if replying...
That being said, the abuse is not just the sole story; and erasing the painful terrible places & spaces of our collective, specific community & indivual traumas does only that. Painting each & every nun & priest that worked there as an abuser is the same as saying ACAB.
True healing takes place in transforming the negatives into positives: look at the Eugene resort in B.C. that turned their residential school into a hotel for tourists coming to drink wine from the vineyards that were once the yards that the stolen indigenous children played in (and were buried under).
Also to be noted, that this incredibly solid building was torn down during the Christmas Holidays-during the postal strike- with a absolutely no community consultation: meaning that that demolition crew made BIG money. I volunteer with the unhoused a couple times a week; and it is no secret that the genocide against the unhoused (who are mostly indigenous) is ramping up- especially in the time after Trump was elected (did anyone else notice the rampant EPS paddy wagons out the few days after the U.S. election?)... Has any attempt to begin building this supposed supportive housing started yet? NOPE. Could the Atonement Home have been desanctified, smudged, cleansed & repurposed for supportive housing MONTHS AGO during a housing crisis we have not seen since this building was built over a 100 years ago? I'll let you think about that next time you witness how many fingers the "dangerous drug addicted homeless" in the bus shelters & LRT stations have on their swollen frozen hands
This feels like a direct assault on ALL those who built & grew up in McCauley & the entire northside over the years; and especially an attack on the Catholic Church community there. Hurt people hurt people, healed people heal people: which one are you?
The large majority of people worldwide forget that Jesus/Yeshua/Issa was murdered by the Romans AND the Jews, his teachings erased, reversed & destroyed (check out the Dead Sea Scrolls) & a tax havens religion founded to worship the fake godhead of him by his murderers & betrayers; which he also said not to do. Christmas itself was created to erase the celebration of the North/Dog star, Sirius (which Jesus/Yeshua/Issa) said we are from; which is now celebrated around the world- even by indigenous people here on Turtle Island- as Winter Solstice (pagans as Yule).
Furthermore, for Rat Creek Press to write an article this one sided is not just extremely poor journalism: it also does an incredible disservice to each & every one of us who fight every day for every marginalized person. If one of us isn't free, none of us are. Please do better.
I welcome the board of directors, writers, vunteers, readers & everyone in the Rat Creek Press community to do more research next time; because we're all here now- indigenous, settler descendants, newcomers & those in between.
Thanks for writing. I had no idea of the history or the place.