Native American Religion

1. Native American Religion

2. 1st Amendment! • Language • Dance • ‘Sacraments’ • Burial/funereal practices

3. Native American religions and the land in which they dwelled were closely connected. “The land, the environment, and a strong sense of place all had great religious significance. Essentially everything was tied to the supernatural, which led to a proliferation of religious practices across the continent.”. While there are many Native American religious practices, most “come under one or more of six basic areas of supernatural concern.” These “concerns” include the omnipresent, invisible “universal force,” “taboo,” pertaining to “the three ‘life crises’ of birth, puberty, and death,” “spirits,” “visions,” the “shaman,” and “communal ceremony.”

4. The Native American religion was initially suppressed by the Colonists who came from Europe with their own particular goals. These included "God, gold, and glory”

5. “Throughout most of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a ‘quasi-theocracy’ reigned in Indian Country where federal policymakers worked hand in hand with Christian churches to impose Christianity among tribal members as part of the government’s civilizing project.”

6. Late 19th/early 20th Century • Progressive era policymakers found no need to separate religious endeavors concerning Native Americans from Indian political policy. (Separation Church and State!) The government provided various religious groups with funds to accomplish Native American conversion. It was during this time that the government “discouraged or imposed bans on many forms of traditional religious practices, including the Sun Dance, use of peyote in ceremonial settings and observance of potlatch rituals.”

7. The Sun Dance is a ceremony practiced differently by several North American Indian Nations, but many of the ceremonies have features in common, including dancing, singing and drumming, the experience of visions, fasting, and, in some cases, self-torture. Sun Dance

8. In order to pacify Christians, “some tribal religious practitioners modified elements of their traditional practices.” In the case of the Sun Dance, “a ceremony of renewal and spiritual reaffirmation,” some tribes “omit[ted] the element of self sacrifice (many participants observed the ritual of skin piercing), reduced the number of days for the ceremony from eight to two and otherwise emphasized the ceremony’s social, rather than religious, features.” In the past, tribes have also moved religious days to coincide with national U.S. holidays.

9. The sun dance was outlawed in the latter part of the nineteenth century, partly because certain tribes inflicted self-torture as part of the ceremony, which settlers found gruesome, and partially as part of a grand attempt to westernize Indians by forbidding them to engage in their ceremonies and speak their language. Sometimes the dance was performed when reservation agents were lax and chose to look the other way. But as a rule, younger generations were not being introduced to the sun dance and other sacred rituals, and a rich cultural heritage was becoming extinct.

10. Actually illegal 1904-1980s • But, in the 1930's, the Sun Dance was relearned and practiced once again.

11. The Ghost Dance The traditional ritual used in the Ghost Dance, the circle dance, has been used by many Native Americans since prehistoric times but was first performed in accordance with Jack Wilson (Wovoka)'s teachings among the Nevada Paiute in 1889. The practice swept throughout much of the American West, quickly reaching areas of California and Oklahoma.

12. Jack’s Vision • God showed Jack a beautiful land filled with wild game and instructed him to return home to tell his people that they must love each other, not fight, and live in peace with the whites. God also stated that Jack's people must work, not steal or lie, and that they must not engage in the old practices of war or the traditional self-mutilation practices connected with mourning the dead. God said that if his people abided by these rules, they would be united with their friends and family in the other world. • In God's presence, Jack proclaimed, there would be no sickness, disease, or old age. According to Jack, he was then given the Ghost Dance and commanded to take it back to his people

13. Interpretation • An alternate interpretation of the Ghost Dance tradition may be seen in the so-called Ghost Shirts rumoured to repel bullets through spiritual power. • Another Lakota interpretation of Jack's religion is drawn from the idea of a "renewed Earth" in which "all evil is washed away". This Lakota interpretation included the removal of all Anglo Americans from their lands, unlike Jack's version of the Ghost Dance, which encouraged harmonious co-existence with Anglos.

14. Wounded Knee Massacre • 1890 – what and how important • 1973 • 1990

15. Native American Church • Established in 1918, “emphasiz[ed] the importance of monogamy, sobriety, and hard work.”

16. Peyote • a psychoactive substance that is found on a cactus and it is used for healing practices and in religious ceremonyIt is taken in the manner that one might take the sacrements of Christianity. "Peyote is not habit forming and ‘in the controlled ambience of a peyote meeting it is in no way harmful’” Rather it is considered a unifying influence on the American Indian life because it provides the “basis for Indian friendships, rituals, social gatherings, travel, marriage, and more. It has been a source of healing and means of expression for a troubled people.

17. 1949 AMA condemned it as habit forming • 1963 Congress tried to regulate • 1965 Drug Abuse Control Act included on list of forbidden substances Some states banned, some NIs exempt but others charged for possession 1978 Religious Freedom Act did not completely protect

18. The BIA,or Indian Office as it was called then, also played a role in the Christianization of Native Americans. Their boarding schools, which were often staffed by missionaries, removed Indian children from the tribe and away from the influence of their cultures.

19. Eagle Feather Law • Passed in 1940, the Eagle Act prohibits the "take; possession; sale; purchase; barter; offer to sell, purchase, or barter; transport, export or import, of any bald or golden eagle, alive or dead, including any part, nest, or egg, unless allowed by permit."

20. Eagle feathers, however, have had spiritual significance to American Indian tribes long before the federal government began passing acts. So in the 1970s, the National Eagle Repository was established to provide feathers of bald and golden eagles to tribal members for ceremonial purposes.

21. Anyone who possesses an eagle feather, and doesn't meet the requirements, could face fines up to $100,000 and a year in prison. A second offense is upgraded from a misdemeanor to a felony, and carries a maximum penalty of two years in prison and a $250,000 fine. The act also provides for a civil penalty of up to $5,000.

22. American Indian Religious Freedom Act 1978 • The Act that established national policy to protect and preserve for Native Americans their inherent right of freedom to believe, express, and exercise their traditional religions, including the rights of access to religious sites, use and possession of sacred objects, and freedom to worship through traditional ceremonies and rites.