Christianity and Native American Spirituality

The concept of having a mixed belief system is not new to me. A person can be a Christian and a Native American if they choose to be, there is nothing evil about it. Unfortunately the Native American tribes have been told that they are ignorant, savage, and evil due to their tribal beliefs.

At the Wednesday night meeting we watched a video, in between speeches, and there were several very good arguments made. My favorite was, “One was that, there are so many Christians who insist that there is only one God and only one way to worship that God and yet there are so many different types of Christianity in existence. If the Christians cannot agree how to worship their own God, how can they tell the Native Americans that they are doing it wrong?

Bob Thomas, a Native American, said, “We too have a covenant with the creator.” One main thing I did learn, was that many of the problems on the Indian Reservations 1970 was that the different tribes had a major identity crisis. On the reservations they disagreed as to who they were. They fought among themselves. Then in Stony Indian Park tribes from around North America began to send their tribal elders to a conference.

This conference allowed the elders to discover that things were rough all over. No one tribe had all of the problems, and many of their problems were the same. Another discovery was that when these elders and medicine men talked about their faiths, they found many similarities. They decided that they all had different ways of respecting the world and that was alright. This brought them all closer together and allowed them to work together to revitalize the old ways.

While this is not the end of the story, it is the important part. If this movement were allowed to continue then life on the reservations might be nicer than they currently are but Christian fundamentalists are never able to leave this sort of thing alone. Very powerful right wing groups continue to attack the Native American traditions as evil. Unfortunately, some people listen to these ignorant people who are afraid of anything different than themselves.

The narrow vision cannot accept difference. Our world is full of variety and much of it is wonderful. Unfortunately there are many out there who believes different is bad. In the case of the Native Americans, this sows mistrust and strife to people who have already suffered enough.