Mother Earth is Crying As We Speak
I can’t say that I individually represent the thoughts of all Native Americans. But I can truthfully say that my views and thoughts about the current dilemma of the earth as we speak, do represent a large portion of Native American people and indigenous people all over the world who still recognize the earth as their Mother and the greatest manifestation of the Creator that we have to relate to as well as the greatest manifestation o f His teachings that have been handed down for a millennia by way of Nature itself. In all the different religions, somewhere in their teachings there are teachings related to taking care of the earth, respecting the earth.
A Native elder once said, ‘The Orientals contemplated Nature, the white man tried to conquer Nature, but the Native American lived within Nature.’ In all the media and libraries of higher learning you can read about people talking about higher technology and progress. Some think that their technology is progress. Yet when you look at the deeper evidence of that which they call progress, it is in fact really a regression rather than a progression.
We are designed to live within Nature. Some religions believe Nature was designed for them, but either way you look at it, we cannot live without Nature – our bodies, our breath, our senses, are all directly tied to Nature. We are designed to live within it.
As we speak, that which they call technology is destroying the environment that our lives depend upon. Within the Native American culture there is a teaching that says ‘do not take more than you need.’ As far as I know other indigenous cultures have that same concept.
In the Americas, where Christianity invaded, their own teachings said gluttony is a sin. Gluttony means to take more than you need. That gluttony, or taking more than you need, is the root cause of all the wars that are taking place today. It is also the reason why the atmosphere has become polluted, our rivers have become polluted, our soil polluted. As we speak, the ocean is becoming more polluted than it ever was before. This all relates back to taking more than we need, or sin.
The word sin is debatable with regard to meaning. For most of us, it relates to anything that takes you away from the Creator. I am somewhat well versed in Christianity as I grew up in the bible belt of Oklahoma, but I also grew up with the teachings and culture of my own Native people. And I can’t help but remember how I read once where someone asked Jesus what he was about and he said, ‘I come that you would know life more abundantly.’ Now to a Native American, life is trees, grass, and whatever as God created it. So those of you who are looking for some anti-Christ – look around you and see… what ultimately brings death. See if the oil brings death, the pollution of our soils and rivers ultimately brings death.
In the area of taking more than you need… When the Europeans came to the Americas they saw vast stretches of land populated by kind hearted people. Columbus and many early explores saw that. Only after our people were pushed off the land, off the places most desireable, only then did there arise conflict. Ultimately the Europeans wanted more and more land. One of the rationale for taking land was we were not using it to its greatest potential. To them the greatest potential was to make money off the land, exploit it for money and become wealthy.
To us, the Earth is our Mother. The Creator is our Father. And the Creator gives us the wind which is his breath and gives us life.
Several of our prophecies of the past, many, told us before the Europeans ever came here that these things would happen. They would come to our shores and decimate us to some degree even after we helped them to survive. After we helped them to survive they would scatter us like leaves before the wind.
In those prophecies it also foretold of a war between the black people and the white people. We were told not to take part in that war, but to seek refuge in the mountains. And there would be great heat upon the earth and the rivers would boil.
When I heard that when I was younger I wondered how could black people hope to sustain any kind of battle against the white people of the land, but that was long ago. But now, I see that 50% of the military or more is black and we have a black president. And… there is a mounting number of militia groups who are anti-black, and their numbers are growing within the US. I do not know if this is that time (as noted by prophesy), but I do see the potential there.
As far as the rivers boiling… I remember thinking that if it got hot enough that the rivers would boil, being on top of a mountain would not help you any. However, as I got older and became more aware of science, I read about methane gas, decomposition of materials, and I thought about it. At the bottom of most rivers there are materials that as they start to decompose will release methane gas as they heat up. To someone seeing a vision – it would be in essence a boiling river. To someone in the past looking at the ocean, looking at the ocean with all the oil coming out of it, it would also look like some kind of boiling effect.
I listen to the radio from time to time. I listen to some of the right wing Christian stations, of which many of the Christian stations are right wing, might more rightly be called wrong wing. They try to say in essence that there is no global warming. They also talk about everything being inevitable and indirectly say it won’t matter what we do, God’s going to come back and clean up the mess that we make. Yet they also believe that when they die or at some point, they’ll be transported to somewhere that they’ll receive a better place to live and stay. I personally don’t understand the logic that if someone left you in a beautiful place and you destroyed it, say a house and you tore out the air conditioning, tore up the plumbing, broke all the windows, and yet you would expect them to come back and give you a better place to stay?
In my reading of some of the bibles that I was given while growing up I learned – the Kingdom of God is within you. It’s not over there or over here. Yet…I never hear them talk about that. I can see why a fat minister on tv would not want to talk about gluttony and sin. The kingdom of God being within you – that is something an individual might dwell upon.
The oriental cultures talk about inner strength and developing that thru different disciplines. The Chinese called it Chi and the Japanese called it Ki. Within the different disciplines they seek to develop inner strength that helps you be the best person you can possibly be. Within Christianity there are all kinds of places where it talks about fasting, prayer, meditation or thought. It’s full of parables that note deeper meanings can be found through both prayer and fasting. But it all goes back to self discipline, inner strength or the Kingdom of God being within you. Self discipline is the foundation of all strengths, knowledge, learning or betterment of circumstance that requires inner strength. In Native American teaching, ceremonies all promote self discipline. All people from time to time are tempted to take more than they need. However with proper teachings and self discipline, it need not be so.
Jesus himself went on to say, your body is your temple keep it clean. Throughout his teachings there are references to being holy. I was reading that the word holy, in the Greek holos – means to be complete, to be whole. The original meaning of Spirit – was the wind. When we talk about the earth or the whole earth, we have to respect the wholeness of the earth and seek to keep it so. When you look at modern society people are born in a building -- a box. They immediately are put inside of a box in the nursery, taken home and put in a box, they live in that box. They go to town in a box, they go to school in a box, and they grow up and work in a box, and with climate control they get their air out of box. Their food comes in a box, and when they die they get put in a box and get put in a box in the Earth for which they really don’t want to return to anyway.
That is called progress but that progress has caused people to disassociate from the wholeness of life. When someone is destroying the earth in some other place and destroying the food chain of another people or species, they don’t seem to worry about it because their food comes in a box and they buy it from a place that’s a box. If you get into trouble they’ll lock you away inside of a box, and they call that a correctional facility.
But in essence, all of these facilities, these boxes, should be aimed at connection. People have become disconnected, disassociated from the real world – earth and Nature. So what you have today is people destroying the environment that they are designed for. I’m not trying to bash Christians. If anything I’d like to prompt them to become more assertive in protecting the earth - the future for our children, respecting the greatest manifestation of God that we have to relate to. I know there are other religions and many are just as quiet as the Christians. As I’m surrounded predominantly by Christians that’s why I have chosen this particular reference for expression.
In the beginning I said our Mother the Earth is crying. It isn’t just the Earth. Our children are crying… some because the very air hurts their eyes, that same air hurts their lungs. Animals too. People are losing their jobs and crying. Native people on the coast cry for their Mother Earth.
Many are concerned for those on the gulf coast losing their way of life, yet many on reservations are prime examples of what happens to a people who lose their way of life. Our people have not recovered to this day from that destruction that was brought upon us by people who wanted to take more than they need.
Sometimes I feel somewhat perplexed in talking about negative things in this way. And I often would like to just find some form of escape and forget about it. But I wasn’t raised that way, taught that way by the Native American culture or the Christians who were around me. In their own books it was taught - do what was right. Jesus himself was a political prisoner, not because he did the right thing – he always did the right thing - but because he tried to right what was wrong.
There was a Native American person who was known more for his political commentary than being Native American. He once said, ‘all wars are holy.’ The reason is political and the outcome is loss of land and resources. This was Will Rogers.
What he was trying to say is religion is used to get people to fight. What that means to me - and you can see it readily - all the countries that go to war try to get their young men to believe they’re fighting for God and country. All the countries that go to war start with their political policies and in the end someone loses resources and land. If you look at what is taking place in Iraq or Afghanistan or the 150 other countries that the United States has soldiers deployed in, if you look at the situation and the economics… it has to do with money and people taking more or wanting more than they need.
The earth cannot sustain the pollution that is taking place. Even within the Christian teaching it is said, ‘thou shalt not commit adultery.’ Adultery means more than an issue between a man and a woman. Adultery means to pollute or put something where it is not supposed to be. Thou shalt not adulterate the rivers, thou shalt not adulterate the air, thou shalt not adulterate the ocean with the oil.
Weeping and crying is a physical manifestation of pain. Pain is a way of letting someone know that there is damage being done. In most cases when there is pain ,the reaction is some uncontrolled movement to move away from the pain or react to the pain. The earth is reacting to the pain, the weeping is taking place. If mankind, if all religions – Judaism, Muslim, Hinduism, Christianity… if all the different religions cannot recognize that they have a common Mother there will be such a great destruction on the earth that only a few indigenous people who know how to live within their environment will survive.
There’s an old saying, I don’t remember who said it but I often quote it. May we live in harmony with the Great Spirit and Mother Earth, our fellow man, and respect our brother’s vision.
In the Spirit of the Indigenous Rights Movement
David Hill
Co-Founder IRM
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