Background: Population and environmental health research illustrate a positive relationship between access to greenspace or natural environments and peoples’ perceived health, mental health, resilience, and overall well-being. This relationship is also particularly strong among Canadian Indigenous populations and social determinants of health research where notions of land, health, and nature can involve broader spiritual and cultural meanings. Among Indigenous youth health and resilience scholarship, however, research tends to conceptualize land and nature as rural phenomena without any serious consideration on their impacts within urban cityscapes. This study contributes to current literature by exploring Indigenous youths’ meaning-making processes and engagements with land and nature in an urban Canadian context. Methods: Through photovoice and modified Grounded Theory methodology, this study explored urban Indigenous youth perspectives about health and resilience within an inner-city Canadian context. Over the course of one year, thirty-eight in-depth interviews were conducted with Indigenous (Plains Cree First Nations and Métis) youth along with photovoice arts-based and talking circle methodologies that occurred once per season. The research approach was also informed by Etuaptmumk or a “two-eyed seeing” framework where Indigenous and Western “ways of knowing” (worldviews) can work alongside one another. Results: Our strength-based analyses illustrated that engagement with and a connection to nature, either by way of being present in nature and viewing nature in their local urban context, was a central aspect of the young peoples’ photos and their stories about those photos. This article focuses on three of the main themes that emerged from the youth photos and follow-up interviews: (1) nature as a calming place; (2) building metaphors of resilience; and (3) providing a sense of hope. These local processes were shown to help youth cope with stress, anger, fear, and other general difficult situations they may encounter and navigate on a day-to-day basis. Conclusions: This study contributes to the literature exploring Indigenous youths’ meaning-making process and engagements with land and nature in an urban context, and highlights the need for public health and municipal agencies to consider developing more culturally safe and meaningful natural environments that can support the health, resilience, and well-being of Indigenous youth within inner-city contexts.

While the influence of institutional religion has decreased over the last 40–50 years, research suggests that a substantial proportion of those not attending religious services continue to engage in religious and spiritual practices on their own and refer to religion as a very important aspect in their lives, and as linked to more positive health outcomes, particularly for those living with chronic conditions. This article provides a scoping review to not only highlight the research that views religion and spirituality as valuable tools for coping with chronic illness conditions, but also to highlight research that explores those who may experience some religious/spiritual doubts or a gradual loss of religiosity or spirituality with the diagnosis of chronic conditions. Regardless of a clinician’s beliefs, the authors argue that some awareness training of the value of religion and spirituality for some patients, can be beneficial. In a society facing an increasing plurality of faiths, this is deemed to be an invaluable discussion. In the end, clinical implications will be discussed.

Indigenous communities from around the world, and particularly marginalized youth from within these communities, have not always been adequately included and valued as potential collaborators in various research processes. Instead, research has relegated Indigenous youth to subjects where adults, operating primarily from Western knowledge positions and assumptions, remain the experts. Given the role of research in informing programs and policies, the ways research meaningfully engages and includes Indigenous youth are of key concern. This article presents experiences gained throughout the duration of a study that sought to identify the knowledge, resources, and capabilities required to support the health, resilience, and well-being of Indigenous youth within an urban Canadian context. In particular, this article focuses on methods and approaches of integrating Indigenous knowledge systems throughout the research process and how this can in turn foster meaningful and transformative engagements with Indigenous youth. We argue for the importance and value of traditional cultural practices and knowledge systems and what we call ceremonies of relationships, existent within Indigenous communities around the world, and how their integration in research processes can support constructive and meaningful engagements with Indigenous youth research collaborators.

By bringing together two important areas of contemporary health research—resilience among Indigenous youth and intersectionality theory—this study advances an intersectionality of resilience framework that exposes intersecting forms of oppression within inner city urban contexts, while also critically reframing intersectionality to include strength-based perspectives of overlapping individual, social, and structural resilience-promoting processes. Drawing on Indigenous methodologies, a “two-eyed seeing” approach, and Stake’s case study methodology involving multiple data sources (i.e., four sharing circles, 38 conversational interviews, four rounds of photovoice, and naturalistic interactions that occurred with 28 youth over an entire year), this qualitative study outlines three intersecting processes that facilitate youth resilience and wellness in various ways: (a) strengthening cultural identity and family connections; (b) engagement in social groups and service to self and community; and (c) practices of the arts and a positive outlook. In the end, implications for research, clinical practice, and health or community interventions are also discussed.