Skip to main content

Pow-WOW


Today we have travelled 170 miles (a mere jaunt in the eyes of the locals) to the Isabella Reservation outside of Mount Pleasant, MI, to see the Annual Pow-Wow of the Saginaw Chippewa Nation.
My knowledge of Native American culture was largely based on John Wayne movies, and have previously only come close to real native Americans when the Canadian Native American Orangmen used to turn up for the Twelfth Parade in Belfast occasionally. I always found it odd that we essentially exported both Orangism and genocide to the Native Americans when our Scots Irish forebearers became the standard bearers of westward expansion! But there they would be in full regalia... Buckskin suit, feather head-dress and collarette.
Today however, couldn't have been further from the Twelfth if you had tried... with the exception of the unending beating of drums, with dance after dance in the searing heat and elaborate costume, putting to shame even the most exhibitionist drum major in a flute band at home.
Yet there were obvious tensions throughout the day... The event clearly depended on tourists to make it viable, yet there were severe restrictions on photography, and even when the announcer said that we could take photographs some individuals objected.
Also the parade was headed by veterans from the US military, who were honoured in the ceremonies, but the opening speaker made it clear that while they honoured the veterans and prayed for those still serving, they did not support the currrent war... And all around the campground were contrasting symbols... some lauding the US military, others seeing it as an instrument of oppression.
Then, in talking to others there are other tensions, including the huge reliance of tribal reservations all across the US on Casino Complexes as a way to generate revenue. The Saginaw Chippewa have theirs right beside the camp-ground at Isabella Reservation, the Soaring Eagle Casino, with carpets all the way from Navan I am assured. While this brings in huge amounts of revenue, there are many within the tribe who feel that the whole casino phenomenon is at odds with their traditional lifestyle and teachings.
Then there are Native Americans who are Christians, indeed there is a United Methodist Church on the reservation, just beside the site of the pow wow. But again there are tensions there as to how much of traditional practice and beliefs, including their drumming and their understanding of the Great Spirit pervading all of Creation, can be absorbed within Christian practice.
I suppose St Paddy and those who followed him had similar debates with the local Irish converts 1600 years ago... and we still haven't got the balance right yet.
How much should we as Christians absorb into church life and sanctify (eg. Eostre, Midwinter Festivities) and how much should we shun (eg. Human sacrifice... though I'm not to sure we made the right decision on that one... It would certainly pull in the crowds).
Today the battle for Northern Irish Protestantism is not fought over the above (although we still haven't got Halloween really sorted out), but epitomised by similar issues to those faced by Native Americans in dealing with their Casinos and drums... though with us it is how we relate to Lottery Funding and wider Orange culture.
Maybe we should invite those Native American Orangemen back to Belfast to show us how to sort it all out! Turn the Twelfth into a Pow-Wow in Barnett's Demesne, and teach the church how to relate to a hurting and radically changing community.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

A Woman of no Distinction

Don't often post other people's stuff here... But I found this so powerful that I thought I should. It's a performance poem based on John 4: 4-30, and I have attached the original YouTube video below. A word for women, and men, everywhere... "to be known is to be loved, and to be loved is to be known." I am a woman of no distinction of little importance. I am a women of no reputation save that which is bad. You whisper as I pass by and cast judgmental glances, Though you don’t really take the time to look at me, Or even get to know me. For to be known is to be loved, And to be loved is to be known. Otherwise what’s the point in doing either one of them in the first place? I WANT TO BE KNOWN. I want someone to look at my face And not just see two eyes, a nose, a mouth and two ears; But to see all that I am, and could be all my hopes, loves and fears. But that’s too much to hope for, to wish for, or pray for So I don’t, not anymore. Now I keep to myself And by that

Psalm for Harvest Sunday

A short responsive psalm for us as a call to worship on Harvest Thanksgiving Sunday, and given that it was pouring with rain as I headed into church this morning the first line is an important remembrance that the rain we moan about is an important component of the fruitfulness of the land we live in: You tend the land and water it And the earth produces its abundance. You crown each year with your bounty, and our storehouses overflow with your goodness. The mountain meadows are covered with flocks and the valleys are filled with corn; Your people celebrate your boundless grace They shout for joy and sing. from Psalm 65

Anointed

There has been a lot of chatter on social media among some of my colleagues and others about the liturgical and socio-political niceties of Saturday's coronation and attendant festivities, especially the shielding of the anointing with the pictured spoon - the oldest and perhaps strangest of the coronation artefacts. Personally I thought that was at least an improvement on the cloth of gold canopy used in the previous coronation, but (pointless) debates are raging as to whether this is an ancient practice or was simply introduced in the previous service to shield the Queen from the TV cameras, not for purposes of sacredness, but understandable coyness, if she actually had to bare her breast bone in puritan 1950s Britain. But as any church leader knows, anything performed twice in a church becomes a tradition. All this goes to show that I did actually watch it, while doing other things - the whole shooting match from the pre-service concert with yer wumman in that lemon-