WASHINGTON - Observances and ceremonies will be held across the country on June 21 to mark the 2006 National Day of Prayer to Protect Native American Sacred Places.
''Native and non-Native people nationwide are gathering to honor sacred places, with a special emphasis on those that are endangered by actions that can be avoided,'' said Suzan Shown Harjo, Cheyenne and Hodulgee Muscogee. Harjo is the president of The Morning Star Institute, which organizes the national prayer days and is a columnist for Indian Country Today.
Some of the gatherings are educational forums, not religious ceremonies, and are open to the general public. Others are ceremonial and may be conducted in private.
This will be the fourth National Day of Prayer for Sacred Places. The observance in Washington, D.C., will be held at the National Museum of the American Indian on the National Mall.
The first National Prayer Day was conducted on June 20, 2003, on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol and nationwide to emphasize the need for Congress to enact a cause of action to protect Native sacred places. That need still exists.
http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096413186
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Monday, May 21, 2007
Quotes
"They told us that Indian ways were bad; they said we must get civilized. I remember that word. It means "be like the white man." I am willing to be like the white man, but I did not believe Indian ways were wrong.
But they kept teaching...the books told how bad the Indians had been to the white man. We all wore white man's clothes and ate white man's food and went to white man's churches and spoke white man's talk.
And so after a while we also began to say Indians were bad. We laughed at our own people and their blankets and cooking pots." -
Sun Elk, Taos Pueblo
But they kept teaching...the books told how bad the Indians had been to the white man. We all wore white man's clothes and ate white man's food and went to white man's churches and spoke white man's talk.
And so after a while we also began to say Indians were bad. We laughed at our own people and their blankets and cooking pots." -
Sun Elk, Taos Pueblo
Holy disaster: Pope alienates indigenous peoples
''Arrogant.'' ''Disrespectful.'' ''Poorly advised.'' These harsh words were not aimed at an unpopular president; not this time. They are the criticisms by Indian leaders in Latin America of Pope Benedict XVI, who again made headlines for culturally insensitive and historically inaccurate remarks.
About this time last year the pope stirred international controversy when he characterizing the Prophet Mohammed as having spread Islam by the sword in an ''evil and inhuman'' manner. On May 15 he declared that the Roman Catholic Church had not imposed itself on the indigenous peoples of the Americas. Pope Benedict continues to stir up controversy wherever in the world he lands. But this particular papal idiom cannot be attributed to or excused as simple ignorance. There is an element of intent in the pope's recent remarks that should anger, and mobilize, indigenous people throughout the world.
In a speech at the Conference of the Latin American and Caribbean Episcopate, the pope characterized pre-contact Indians as ''silently longing'' for Christianity and stated that ''the proclamation of Jesus and of his Gospel did not at any point involve an alienation of the pre-Columbus cultures, nor was it the imposition of a foreign culture.'' It may be the most blatantly erroneous statement about the Christian legacy on indigenous cultures ever uttered.
http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096415037
Click link to read more.
About this time last year the pope stirred international controversy when he characterizing the Prophet Mohammed as having spread Islam by the sword in an ''evil and inhuman'' manner. On May 15 he declared that the Roman Catholic Church had not imposed itself on the indigenous peoples of the Americas. Pope Benedict continues to stir up controversy wherever in the world he lands. But this particular papal idiom cannot be attributed to or excused as simple ignorance. There is an element of intent in the pope's recent remarks that should anger, and mobilize, indigenous people throughout the world.
In a speech at the Conference of the Latin American and Caribbean Episcopate, the pope characterized pre-contact Indians as ''silently longing'' for Christianity and stated that ''the proclamation of Jesus and of his Gospel did not at any point involve an alienation of the pre-Columbus cultures, nor was it the imposition of a foreign culture.'' It may be the most blatantly erroneous statement about the Christian legacy on indigenous cultures ever uttered.
http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096415037
Click link to read more.
Piles of rocks spark an American Indian mystery
By Jason Szep
May 18, 2007, 13:12 GMT
NORTH SPRINGFIELD, Rhode Island - In a thick forest of maple, willow and oak trees where 17th century European settlers fought hundreds of American Indians, algae-covered stones are arranged in mysterious piles.
Wilfred Greene, the 70-year-old chief of the Wampanoag Nation's Seaconke Indian tribe, says the stone mounds are part of a massive Indian burial ground, possibly one of the nation's largest, that went unnoticed until a few years ago.
'When I came up here and looked at this, I was overwhelmed,' said Greene, a wiry former boxer, standing next to one of at least 100 stone piles -- each about 3 feet (1 meter) high and 4 feet wide -- on private land in this northern Rhode Island town of about 10,600 people.
'I know it has significance -- absolutely,' he said.
http://news.monstersandcritics.com/usa/features/article_1306188.php/Piles_of_rocks_spark_an_American_Indian_mystery
Click link to read full article.
May 18, 2007, 13:12 GMT
NORTH SPRINGFIELD, Rhode Island - In a thick forest of maple, willow and oak trees where 17th century European settlers fought hundreds of American Indians, algae-covered stones are arranged in mysterious piles.
Wilfred Greene, the 70-year-old chief of the Wampanoag Nation's Seaconke Indian tribe, says the stone mounds are part of a massive Indian burial ground, possibly one of the nation's largest, that went unnoticed until a few years ago.
'When I came up here and looked at this, I was overwhelmed,' said Greene, a wiry former boxer, standing next to one of at least 100 stone piles -- each about 3 feet (1 meter) high and 4 feet wide -- on private land in this northern Rhode Island town of about 10,600 people.
'I know it has significance -- absolutely,' he said.
http://news.monstersandcritics.com/usa/features/article_1306188.php/Piles_of_rocks_spark_an_American_Indian_mystery
Click link to read full article.
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