From the Late July 2014 North Woods Call
I’ve been reading a book called “God is Red” by Native American scholar Vine Deloria Jr., which ostensibly contrasts Native American religious traditions with other faiths—particularly Christianity.
The author talks a lot about land, wildlife, plants and place—central characters in the belief system of American Indians and other indigenous people around the world.
Mostly, however, he lambasts western thought and culture, zeroing in on Christianity as the root cause of the “great weakness” of the United States—the alleged inability to respect or tolerate those who are different.
“The future of humankind,” he says, “lies waiting in those who will come to understand their lives and take up their responsibilities to all living things.”
On the surface, I think Deloria is unduly harsh on Christian beliefs and traditions. He often seems blind to the true nature of Christianity, or what its adherents are actually called to do and be. But who can blame him—given the violent disobedience, contempt for other living things and general hypocrisy of many who have called themselves Christian over the years? There are important lessons to be learned by facing these inconsistencies and thinking about the consequences.
Thousands of years of occupancy on their lands taught tribal peoples the sacred landscapes for which they were responsible, according to Deloria. It was not what people believed to be true that was important, but what they experienced to be true.
As a result, the vast majority of Indian tribal religions have a sacred center at a particular place—be it a river, a mountain, a plateau, a valley, or other natural features. This center enables them to “look out among the four dimensions and locate their lands, to relate all historical events within the confines of this particular land and to accept responsibility for it.”
Thus, tribal religions are actually complex collections of attitudes, beliefs and practices fine-tuned to harmonize with the lands on which the people live.
Western European people, by contrast, “have never learned to consider the nature of the world discerned from a spatial point of view,” Deloria says. Christianity, instead, has tended toward dominance, control and defeat of the natural world, which is largely viewed in economic terms as something to be exploited.
As a result, we move from place-to-place with no concern for the sacredness of land, or important spiritual aspects of the places from which we come. We even select our churches and religious affiliations based on social status, Deloria says, moving from denomination-to-denomination as our economic and employment situations change.
“The question that emerges,” he says, “is whether land is a ‘thing’ to be used to generate income, or a homeland on which people are supposed to live in a sacred manner.”
Sacred places, according to Deloria, are the foundation of all other beliefs and practices, because they represent the presence of the sacred in our lives. “They properly inform us,” he says, “that we are not larger than nature and that we have responsibilities to the rest of the natural world that transcend our own personal desires and wishes.”
Although I happily identify myself as a Christian, I have long been a believer in sacred places rooted in the history of our ancestors. And—like our Native American brethren—I experience spiritual renewal when I visit those places.
That is not to say that we should worship creation over the creator—as some do—but simply that we should recognize some things as sacred and others as profane.
The relentless advance of civilization always seems to overrun the holier, more natural things of life. We see that even with much of today’s technology, which in many cases is enslaving us to the profane and destroying everything that gets in its way—including common sense.
Unfortunately for us and the planet, every human being—Christian, Native American, or whatever—is filled with contradictions. That’s why none of us can redeem ourselves so that we are acceptable to the Great Spirit. But that truth does not give any of us a free pass. We are still accountable for our choices.
In the religious world of most native tribes, birds, animals and plants compose the “other peoples” of creation, according to Deloria. If Jews and Christians see the actions of a deity at sacred places in the Holy Land and in churches and synagogues, he says, traditional Indian people experience spiritual activity as all of creation becomes active participants in ceremonial life.
Regardless whether one perceives God as red, white, black, or some other hue, the earth cries out for redemption and renewal.
And, as Deloria says, every society needs sacred places, “because they help instill a sense of social cohesion in the people and remind them of the passage of generations that have brought them to the present. A society that cannot remember and honor its past is in peril of losing its soul.”
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