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Contact: Carol Fouke, NCC, 212-870-2252

NCC4/21/97 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Practictioners Call for Change in Relationship 
between Indian Community and Church Bodies
National Council of the Churches of Christ
Internet: c/o carol_fouke.parti@ecunet.org

By Robert Lear

 OKLAHOMA CITY, April 21, 1997 ---- "All people 
of good heart" have been called to stand with Native 
Americans and other indigenous people in confronting 
racism and all "consequences that compromise the 
integrity of our God-given spiritualities" languages 
and customs.

 That call is at the core of a 300-word 
statement introduced April 19 at the close of a 
three-day international, interfaith consultation 
here on the heritage and future of native peoples.  
More than 90 persons from a dozen mainline 
Protestant, conciliar, and Roman Catholic groups, 
and traditional native practitioners attended the 
sessions.

 "We declare to all that we will no longer be 
invisible participants in the church and American 
society,"  the statement says.  We will no longer 
tolerate the colonial imposition of European church 
structures and doctrine on indigenous communities."

 The statement asserts that the "Gospel of Jesus 
Christ demands that we (the American Indian 
Christian Community) be freed from the yoke and 
mantle of traditions and structures that . 
contribute to the disintegration of our cultural 
heritage, communal harmony and the God-given right 
to self determination."

 A committee drawn from consultation 
participants drafted the statement.  Although not 
formally discussed or adopted, it was in harmony 
with the presentations and discussions of the three 
days.  Accompanying the statement were suggestions 
of implementing strategies.

 Key themes in the statement appeared frequently 
throughout the three days:  "Spirituality,"  
"genocide,"  "sacred sites,"  "sovereignty,"  
"racism,"  "Eurocentric religion."

 "Native people do not have the same religious 
freedom as other citizens," said Sammy Toineeta, a 
member of the Lakota Nation who staffs the National 
Council of Churches racial justice program.  
Toineeta also warned that tourism and development 
are threatening sacred sites.

 Ola Cassadore Davis of the Apache Survival 
Coalition in Arizona, Kaleo Patterson of the Justice 
for Kanaka Maoli Initiative in Hawaii, and Jean 
LaRose of the Amerindian  Peoples Organization in 
Guyana joined in the concern for sacred sites such 
as Mt. Graham in Arizona where an 800-year old 
shrine now has been put off limits by governmental 
authority.

 Dr. George E. Tinker, an Osage and Cherokee who 
is professor at Iliff School of Theology in Denver 
and pastor of a Native American Church, singled out 
"oppressive" structures of Christianity brought by 
missionaries.

 "The Christianity imposed on us was a European 
Christianity," he said.  "Maybe we don't have to 
build a church in English style before we can be 
Christian."

 The Rev. Paul Ojibway, director of the Graymoor 
Ecumenical and Interreligious Institute's Washington 
office, called spirituality an essential part of 
native communities.  Language and symbols are the 
way we express "what is most sacred to ourselves," 
he said.

 In the closing address of the consultation, Dr. 
Henrietta Mann, a Cheyenne who is professor of 
Native American Studies at the University of 
Montana, Missoula, said that indigenous peoples 
"have gone through a long cold winter" of 
discrimination, desecration and deprivation.  "But 
now the winter is over, the much awaited springtime 
is here, and we must rebuild."

 However, she cautioned, "it is past time for 
empty words-as empty as the words on the (hundreds 
of) treaties with the government (that was) 
established on our land."  Native peoples, she said, 
were not "put on earth to have our ways denigrated" 
and "our culture, our ceremonies and our thoughts 
assaulted."

 Worship at sunrise and tribal singing marked 
each day of the consultation.  The closing service 
with a number of native elements was a memorial for 
the 168 people killed in the bombing of the Alfred 
P. Murrah Federal Building on April 19, 1995.  The 
victims included Raymond L. Johnson, husband of Anne 
Marshall, a staff executive of the United Methodist 
Commission on Christian Unity and Interreligious 
Concerns, who chaired the planning committee for the 
consultation here.

 Theme of the consultation was "Honoring the 
Past: Building for the Future."  Sponsoring bodies 
were Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), The 
Episcopal Church, Evangelical Lutheran Church in 
America, International Council of Community 
Churches, Interfaith Relations Commission of the 
National Council of the Churches of Christ in the 
U.S.A., Oklahoma Conference of Churches, 
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Tekawitha Conference 
of the Roman Catholic Church, United Church of 
Christ and United Methodist Church.

-  end  -

Statement of Participants in the Consultation on
 Honoring the Past: Building for the Future
Oklahoma City
April 21, 1997

On the anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing at a 
historic gathering of Native American Christians and 
Native American practitioners we are reminded once 
again of the history of violence in North America 
and the resulting culture of violence in the United 
States.  This ecumenical and interfaith consultation 
declares that we will no longer tolerate the 
colonial imposition of European church structures 
and doctrine on indigenous communities.

The American Indian Christian community declares 
that the Gospel of Jesus Christ demands that we, as 
a People, be freed from the yoke and mantle of 
traditions and structures that have and continue to 
contribute to the disintegration of our cultural 
heritage, communal harmony and the God-given right 
to self determination as children of the Creator and 
sisters and brothers in Christ.

As we journey together as the People of the one 
Creator of all, we declare to all that we will no 
longer be invisible participants in the church and 
American society.  As a People of dignity, honor and 
respect, we call on all people of good heart to 
stand with us in confronting the systemic and 
institutional racism, marginalization and fear - and 
all their consequences that compromise the integrity 
of our God-given spiritualities. The authenticity of 
our individual and tribal histories also includes 
preservation of our identity, language and custom, 
and the possibility of our sovereignty as indigenous 
nations before God and the world.

In this historic meeting, the American Indian 
Christian and Traditional practitioners committed 
themselves to a fundamental change in interfaith and 
ecumenical collaboration in the life of the churches 
with the national American Indian community.  In 
particular, the Consultation develops positions on 
issues of sacred sites, sovereignty, spirituality, 
and youth.

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