CANADA   –   Indigenous leaders waited on the snowy tarmac at Montreal’s Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport Saturday as the precious cargo was unloaded from an Air Canada jet. The boxes contained more than 60 precious cultural artifacts, including a rare Inuit sealskin kayak, which were taken from First Nations, Inuit, and Métis communities more than a century ago and have been held in the Vatican museums and vaults ever since. The emotional homecoming, shown in footage by CNN-affiliate CBC News, represents the culmination of a tireless three-year campaign by Indigenous leaders, which was endorsed by Pope Francis before he died, on the heels of his historic apology for abuses committed at Canada’s church-run residential schools. The repatriation of the artifacts also comes as museums around the world have increasingly returned items in their collections that were stolen or potentially acquired unethically to their countries of origin. First Nations National Chief Cindy Woodhouse Nepinak hailed the return of the artifacts as an “important and emotional moment for many First Nations across the country” during a press conference Saturday.

But she acknowledged that the long project of reconciliation continues. “We’ve come a long way, and we have a long way to go.” There is no public inventory of the goods being repatriated, which represent a small portion of the thousands of colonial-era Indigenous objects in the Vatican. But among the 62 artifacts is an Inuvialuit sealskin kayak from the western Arctic, which was the last to come off the plane in its own cargo box, CBC reported. The artifacts were first brought to Rome to be displayed at the 1925 Vatican Mission Exposition, a 13-month long exhibit promoting the Church’s influence around the world that drew millions of visitors.