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"Religious freedom for American Indians means something much more than going to church on Sunday. 'It's an expanded frame of reference for them; religion is a part of their total culture,"… Therein lies the beauty and complexity of the continuing tradition of Native American religiosity in this country. "

Religious Freedom and Native Americans
By John Dart

Wintu medicine woman Flora Jones had been contending for seven years with bears and the U.S. Forest Service in an area southof gleaming Mt. Shasta, where she practices her craft. Bears had ripped down and destroyed her $400 tents on five separate occasions. Forest rangers had warned the 72-year-old spiritual healer that she must remove the wooden platform for her tent and an outhouse, both permanent structures she used for patients treated over a period of days in Trinity National Forest. She could gather her herbs, other plants and animal parts, officials added, only if she confined herself to one acre.

Flora Jones complained in the winter of 1978-79 to the newly-establisbed California Native American Heritage Commission about the bears as well as the rangers since she believed some bears were being "imported" from Yellowstone National Park. Though the bears remained a marauding threat, the medicine woman was able with the intervention of the state commission to get a special use permit from the Forest Service to roam at will in the traditional Wintu healing area, where her mother and father had practiced before her, and she was permitted to maintain two structures there.

I

This case is believed to be the first successful use of the American Indian Religious Freedom Act, which was passed as a joint resolution of Congress in the summer of 1978. The act and its subsequent incorporation into federal code marked a major

John Dart is religion writer for the Los Angeles Times. He is the author of The Laughing Savior: The Discovery and Significance of the Nag Hammadi Gnostic Library (1976) and a previous contributor to THEOLOGY TODAY. This article is a revised and updated version of a news story which appeared in the Los Angeles Times, February 18, 1979, for which Mr.Dart received the 1980 Jim Merrell Religious Liberty Memorial Award.

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turning point in government attitudes toward Indian religions, which in the past were marked by interference in Native religions.

The General Allotment Act in 1887 spoke characteristically of the priority of building mission schools on Indian lands "to civilize and Christianize the Indians." By the mid-1900s, Indian beliefs and traditions were more fully appreciated. Yet the First Amendment protection of religious liberty did not often apply to citizens whose pews were rock and dirt, whose sanctuary stretched from horizon to horizon, whose sacred objects sometimes included illegal substances and feathers of endangered species, and whose spiritual havens sometimes sat on top of untapped energy resources. Compounding these difficulties have been widespread fears that many of the old ways and insights were being lost as the elders died and young people became dispirited or disinterested and drifted away.

With the new law, federal agencies are to "protect and preserve" the rights of Indians, Eskimos, Aleuts, and native Hawaiians to exercise their traditional religions. Native Americans are to be granted, among other things, access to sacred sites on federal lands, use and possession of sacred objects from nature, and other freedoms to perform ceremonial rites.

"By itself, the law (Public Law 95-341) doesn't have a lot of teeth," argued attorney Kurt V. Blue Dog, codirector of the Native American Rights Fund in Boulder, Colo. "But it sets the tone for the federal government, and that's probably the most important thing it does," the 30-year-old Sioux said.

In early 1981, a concern was whether traditional Indian burial grounds, sacred areas to Native Americans, would be exempted from the freedoms given to archeologists in the Archeological Resources Protection Act, which passed Congress in 1979. Public hearings were held in 1981 on proposed regulations for the act, now termed Public Law 96-95.

II

The American Indian Religious Freedom Act has appeared to have some influence in aiding Indian religious causes, although the extent of its protection is usually difficult to determine.

· Paiute and Shoshone Indians have obtained greater access to hot springs on the China Lake Naval Weapons Center in California's Mojave Desert. Stephen Rios, former head of the state Native American Heritage Commission, said the area is well-documented as an Indian healing spa and religious site.

"The most important spirit for them is one which works at night," Rios said. U.S. Navy officials had been allowing escorted daytime visits, but they finally relented and allowed Indians to stay overnight on weekends when the weapons range is usually closed down.

· Three Indian inmates at Lompoc (Calif.) federal prison filed suit to build a sweat lodge for ceremonies with the sacred pipe. Just before

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the case was to go to trial in 1979, prison officials signed a consent decree.

The sweat lodge ceremony, a common religious practice of the Plains Indians, was permitted in some federal prisons before the Lompoc case. But attorney Blue Dog said he believes the agreement may have helped Indian religious practices to be recognized in additional U.S. prisons.

· The ritual eating of peyote buttons, the tops of a spineless cactus plant, by members of the Native American Church generally has been favored by court decisions. Yet, many states still prohibit possession and use of peyote because it contains a hallucinogenic substance.

In one of the first court decisions after the American Indian Religious Freedom Act passed, a Superior Court judge in the state of Washington ruled in October 1978 that three Indians with peyote arrested while driving to a spiritual encampment at an Indian reservation were within their rights to have it. Though he alluded to the new act, Judge Bill Kohls based his decision on the First Amendment.

The law is still not widely known, however, said Blue Dog, referring to the Kansas attorney general's threat in 1981 to arrest Indians participating in peyote rituals.

· Tribes such as the Blackfoot, Cree, and Mohawk, who live on both sides of the U.S.-Canadian border, had been plagued by the occasional opening by customs officials of their "medicine bundles," which were prepared and sealed by medicine men. Tribe members say such inspection destroys the sacredness of the objects. Customs officials have been asked to advise inspectors of sensitivity on the bundles.

These controversies involve governmental agencies for the most part, and they have given Indians hope that the law can work. Less clear is whether it will have any effect where the conflict involves private interests and Indian rights.

Chumash Indians have tried in various ways to protect their burial grounds at Point Conception, west of Santa Barbara, Calif., from excavations for a liquid natural gas terminal. The grounds and what the Indians said was their traditional "western gate" for departing souls is mostly on private land. That issue, which is complicated by the economics of natural gas supplies, is a complex one.

A much simpler situation was resolved in 1979 when the privatelyowned Denver Art Museum returned a two-foot-tall wooden "war god" to the Zuni Tribe in New Mexico. The museum received the figurine as a gift about twenty-five years earlier, but it had been apparently stolen from the tribe around the turn of the century.

"The Zunis believe that these war gods have vast powers. In order to control these powers they have prayers and supplications. But the war gods have to be in their natural settings," said a staff member of the Native American Rights Fund, which helped with the negotiations.

III

The shift in federal policy towards Indian religions began in 1978 when former Sen. James Abourezk, a Democrat from South Dakota,

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held hearings. He cited increasing instances of government interference with the rights of Indians to practice their religions, often because of insensitivity, neglect, or lack of knowledge of Indian customs.

"This state of affairs is enhanced by the perception of many non-Indian officials that because Indian religious practices are different than their own, they somehow do not have the same status as a 'real' religion," Abourezk said.

Non-Indians have shown a vague respect for Indian religions in a variety of ways-as reflected by the popularity of an Indian prayer: "Great Spirit, grant that I may not criticize my neighbor until I have walked a mile in his moccasins." White churchgoers have sentimental reminders at Thanksgiving of Indians celebrating the harvest with Pilgrims in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Some white Americans interested in other religions have sought out books on Indian mythology and medicine men willing to share their stories.

But some say that a broader regard for Indian religion as a "real" religion has not been helped by having Indian religious customs described in print primarily by anthropologists, archeologists, folk-lorists, and even art historians, rather than by theologians.

That is changing. Esteem is growing in academic religious studies for Native American religions. The American Academy of Religion's annual conference added Native American traditions to its categories of seminars in 1972. Eleven papers were presented on the subject at the academy's 1978 meeting, for example. "North American religion cannot be considered a marginal area in religious studies any longer," said Ake Hultkrantz, a European regarded as one of the foremost authorities in the field. "Aboriginal North America is and has been the home of hundreds of religions which are interesting in themselves and have importance for the knowledge of religious expressions," Hultkrantz said. He claimed that there was "a growing realization among educated people that in many respects these religions attain a loftiness and a dignity that even surpass some of the supposed 'higher' religions."

Joseph Epes Brown, dean of American scholars on Indian religion, says Indian beliefs in spirits dwelling in plants, rocks, and the forces of nature are much more complex than the usual characterization by outsiders as "animism." In addition, Indian religions speak with more force to environmental problems than Christianity. "It is perhaps the message of the sacred nature of the land, of place, that today has been the most responsible for forcing the Native American vision upon the mind and conscience of the non-Indian," said Brown, who teaches at the University of Montana.

IV

Some traditions, however, may have suffered irreparable damage during the centuries when Indian religions were not highly regarded by whites. Certain ceremonies, which sometimes included self-torture, were considered debasing by federal Indian bureau officials. They

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discouraged the Ghost Dance movement, which swept Western reservations in 1889 and 1890. Participants danced through the night until they collapsed from exhaustion. In most versions of the Sun Dance, participants pierced their muscle layers with skewers which were tied by long lines to a central pole. Then they danced until the skewers fell out. That and similar ceremonies were prohibited until 1935.

One Indian answer to government restrictions, Christian missions, and a growing alcohol problem among Indians was the peyote-using Native American church, which incorporates some Christian imagery and uses the Bible. Indians in Mexico began using peyote in ceremonies more than 400 years ago. The practice spread to North American Indians in the early 1800s, and became a part of the ritual of the new Native American Church, which was incorporated in 1941 in Oklahoma.

Basic tenets of the Native American Church are love of one another, care of family, self-reliance, and avoidance of alcohol. Many Indians reported that they were helped through a drinking problem after becoming members. Its prayer meetings, held in teepees, are often done at the request of a "patient" or family, but can also occur on any U.S. holiday, from Christmas to Veterans' Day. Most of the night is spent sitting on the hard dirt around the fire, sharing experiences and prayer. The chewing of peyote "allows you to increase your feelings beyond an ordinary level," said church member Dean Jackson, who has also served as president of the All Indian Rodeo Association.

Church president Emerson Jackson of Shiprock, N.M., estimated membership at about 65,000 Navajos, the largest U.S. tribe, and tens of thousands of other Indians. Jackson admits to some internal problems with keeping open supply lines to the U.S.-approved peyote harvesting areas in Texas and with policing the use of the drug. "We have to tighten up the trafficking and control of our sacramental peyote because some of the people don't know how to use it," he said. "Sometimes people mix it with other drugs and cause us as a church to have a bad reputation."

The gradual erosion of Indian customs, most of which are much older than those of the Native American Church, is a troublesome problem. Navajo traditional medicine men made a concerted effort in the late 1970s to begin licensing themselves and tightening standards. Drink would be prohibited before or during a ceremony, and no one would be allowed to attend who was under alcoholic or narcotic influence. Although a few medicine men in this century have dictated valuable insights and knowledge to non-Indian authors, the usual way to transmit spiritual lore has been ritual and oral tradition.

The complaint of the Northern Cheyenne tribe of Montana to Abourezk's hearings was typical: "We are painfully aware that much has already been lost, and since there are no resources specifically earmarked for purposes of preserving our culture, we can further anticipate losing more as each one of our elders leaves us."

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Archie Fire Lame Deer, a Sioux medicine man living in Santa Barbara, says so many tribes have lost their own distinct religion that they are adopting the sacred pipe, Sun Dance, and other practices from the influential Plains Indians. Lame Deer's father, who died five years ago, is credited, among others, with keeping the Sun Dance alive for many decades after its ban by the government. Lame beer continues the tradition, but now in the face of modern influences.

One of the most authentic Sun Dances today, according to Lame Deer, takes place each summer in Northern California at a school for Native American and Mexican-American studies. "But you go to Sun Dances in South Dakota and you see that it's a charade," he said. "There are cameras, tape recorders, loudspeakers, electric lights. These are outlawed in the sacred Sun Dance."

Indian religions make stringent demands in order for individuals to "walk the Good Red Road," as many put it. "Our teachings tell us to purify ourselves, and to be strong in body, mind, heart, and spirit, to unify our nations and hold to the creation's natural laws… one writer claimed in Akwesasne Notes, a well-known Indian newspaper published in New York State. "There may be no elders," continued the writer Saupaquant, "but there are the teachings of nature, the vision quests, the fasting, the sweats, the observation of the earth, the growing things, the animal creatures, the voice of the winds, the rocks, the thunders - and our own hearts and minds in the quiet hours of the morning. For those who want to listen, the voices still speak."

Sotsisowah, a Seneca, declares that the first duty of Indians is to show appreciation and regard for one another. "We can see that it is the natural way, just as the first thing people do upon meeting is to greet one another with a wish of good health." Everything in the world needs to know it is appreciated, Sotsiswah said, advice that would please non-Indians who talk to their house plants. "It is true that plant beings are nourished by soil and air, but it is known, too, that their health and well-being are encouraged by our words…. For this reason, our grandparents walked among the Corn Sisters and talked to them, encouraging them to grow."

V

Religion for many Indians, of course, is the Christian religion. One of the most comprehensive surveys of Christian missions among Indians, published in 1979 by World Vision International, Monrovia, Calif., estimated the Indian Christian population at more than 320,000, about 40 percent of all American Indians. The core membership is much lower, Christian leaders agree.

R. Pierce Beaver, the survey's author, reported that "the prevailing desire … almost without exception" among mainline Protestant and Catholic church workers today is to conserve and adapt traditional spiritual lore. These missionaries, pastors, and officials, Beaver said, believe that "basic Native American religious concepts are compatible

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(with Christianity) and that adaption in theology and Christian practice is desirable." In citing such adaptions, Beaver said the Episcopalians of Navajoland have admitted medicine men into church membership and allowed them to offer prayers. In addition, Beaver noted, Native American caucuses and councils within several denominations have shown some clout in arguing the needs of Indian ministries. It is only the very conservative evangelical church groups which are generally opposed to retaining tribal religious ideas or customs in Christian settings, he said. Lloyd Thompson of the Navajo Office of Native Healing Sciences has noted that Pentecostal revivalists have at times persuaded Indians who "accepted Jesus" to turn over for burning some medicine bundles made over a century ago.

VI

The law that evolved from the American Indian Religious Freedom Act cannot protect Indian spiritual lore from encroachment of secularization or proselytization. It is aimed at righting federal policies and protection of traditional practices that can be seen as indeed "religious" interests.

The act came too late to figure into the discussions over strip mining for coal in the early 1970s on Black Mesa in Arizona. Hopi traditional leaders opposed it, arguing that the land was part of the heart of Mother Earth and that the Hopi have left religious items, clan markings, and the bodies of their deceased there. "Strip mining Black Mesa is like ripping apart St. Peter's in order to sell the marble," they maintained in their losing cause.

On the other hand, the Zuni tribe in New Mexico has had some success in obtaining ownership rights to the Zuni Salt Lake after missing that chance in the late 1940s because of bad advice. Zuni legends said the lake, about forty miles south of Gallup in an extinct volcanic crater, was once on Zuni tribal lands. But, the story goes, the Salt Mother became offended when people began polluting the area and she (the lake) moved several miles away. Pilgrimages have been made annually to mollify the Salt Mother.

If Indian tribes told their innumerable tales about traveling natural features which they actually own and list numerous areas as sacred spots, the question arises whether the law protecting religious practices would be used to block innumerable construction and energy-development ventures.

In one sense, says Stephen Rios of California, Indians would claim that all land is sacred and should not be desecrated. But, practically speaking, Rios indicated that Indian groups probably would not seek to block or modify a development unless an area could be shown to have a history of Indian spiritual use or continuing religious importance.

The real and potential conflicts of interest between developmental and Indian rights are paralleled in a way by the dual interests which the U.S. Forest Service and the National Park Service have to resolve.

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"There is legislation saying that the land is open to the public, but if you have an Indian religious ceremony that is supposed to be private, it is not clear that you could deny the public the right to observe," said Tom Mulhern, of the National Park Service's division of cultural resources management. A NPS directive advises that "equitable arrangements must be negotiated by the park manager."

Like many park officials, Mulhern realizes that religious freedom for American Indians means something much more than going to church on Sunday. "It's an expanded frame of reference for them; religion is part of their total culture," he said.

Therein lies the beauty and the complexity of the continuing tradition of Native American religiosity in this country.