Wellbriety Journey for Forgiveness
Red Lake Indian School
Red Lake, MN, June 11, 2009
The Wellbriety Journey for Forgiveness Visits Warm Springs
Red Lake Band Tribal Chairman
Floyd Jourdain welcomes the gathering. Larry Stillday went to the old Red Lake Boarding School site and performed a pipe ceremony for the little spirits that were left behind. He told us that the day was calm, but when he did the pipe ceremony there was a slight breeze. He says the breeze was the spirit world acknowledging what we are doing at the Journey visit today.
Larry is a long time friend of White Bison and the Wellbriety Movement’s way of cultural healing. He’s one of the people behind the yearly Wellbriety Fests that take place at Red Lake. He gave the opening prayer at the Journey visit in Red Lake and later told us that while we are doing this ceremony here today the ancestors are sitting with us, sitting just as we are. He said we are the voices of those generations who all experienced trauma, lost life, ran away and died, and for the ones that didn’t understand.
Larry Stillday speaks after
giving the Opening Prayer. The Journey crew arrived about 8:30 a.m. and gathered around for some visiting before the doors were opened. There were many volunteers to help set up and move things around. Our space was quite large inside the Red Lake Humanities Building and the sound system was good. The Red Lake Nation was glad to have us there and welcomed us with enthusiasm. Floyd “Buck” Jourdain, Chairman, Red Lake Band, welcomed us and expressed his thoughts. He thanked us for bringing the Hoop to the community again. There was a good turnout. By the end of the day about 125 people had signed in.
The Red Lake Anishnabe (Ojibwe) Reservation in northern Minnesota had its share of boarding schools in the historic times. The three main institutions were the government operated Ponemah Boarding school and the Red Lake Boarding School, as well as the church-run St. Mary's Mission Boarding school. Red Lake children also went to the off-reservation schools such as Haskell Institute, Pipestone school, Hampton Institute, Vermilion school, Morris school, Tomah school, Carlisle school, Chilocco school, Chamberlain school, Riggs Institute, Toledo school and Pierre school. The sharing at Red Lake during our visit encompassed memories of the more recent times from the 1940’s onward. The memories weren’t real good.
Frances Miller spoke with great heart
about her boarding school experiences. One boarding school survivor told us there were ugly parts that he can never forget. He said that they were deloused and their hair was cut off whether or not they had lice. He also remembered something that we heard at some of the other gatherings––that many kept the culture alive by hiding out. He said from 1958 through 1978 many practiced spirituality in the woods. They had to take their ceremonies out into the woods and hide to do them. The year 1978 was the year that the American Indian Religious Freedom Act became law.
Frances Miller remembers the time in boarding school when she had enough. She went and told the Father that she and her sister wanted to go home because she didn’t like the way they’d been treated. The Priest spoke to her in Ojibwe and asked them to stay. He told her if they would stay he would make sure these things wouldn’t happen. Frances went on to say, “We have had nothing but broken promises our whole life.” Sure enough, after Mass in the morning, she ran away because she didn’t want to get baptized. “I defended my traditions and spirituality,” she remembers. But when they caught her they had the whip, locked her in her room and tied her to the bed. She was told she was going to stay until school is over. “They pretended to be good people and told our parents that we would be alright. But we weren’t alright” she said.
Father Pat of St. Mary's Mission
Church spent the day with us. Frances said this was a hard subject for her. It is still hard to talk about and remember. She was seven years old when she entered boarding school. It wasn’t bad enough that they cut and shaved off our hair she remembered. If she spoke her language she would have to stand in corner and hold her tongue. She grew up in the boarding school with the priest and nuns. She recalls being slapped and beaten. She still has scars on her legs from the whips. Frances says that she thought it was the way life was lived. But Indian people didn’t live that way.
How did she begin to heal? She started following tradition…walking the good road. It took a long time. She fell into alcoholism to forget, but it didn’t make the pain go away and it didn’t make the ugliness go away. It didn’t make the priest or the nuns any better. She revealed that the only thing that has helped her was to come home and follow the drum. Frances says she is glad to see the feathers (Sacred Hoop) here. It has taken her a long time to try to forgive what happened in the boarding school. It has been a long journey for her. Francis believes there is no end to what the chimokeman (white man) does to our people. But she is on the journey to forgiveness, finally. She prays every day to learn to forgive, to walk the Red Road. She hopes and prays that our kids don’t go through what we went through; that our kids are treated with respect. She wants to forget whatever took place and forgive wholly from her heart. She thinks she took the first step today.
The Red Lake Wellbriety Drum St. Mary’s Mission Church in Red Lake celebrated its 120–year anniversary on June 21, 2009. St. Mary’s boarding school was the mission school that began under contract with the federal government in 1889. Father Pat of St. Mary’s participated in the Forgiveness gathering at Red Lake on June 11, sharing with us both in words and with prayer.
Father Pat says he will be leaving soon after 12 years at St. Mary’s. He has learned many things here and he appreciates all of it. He goes on to say, “Am I responsible for the past? Yes in part. How does one make amends?” He said there are individual apologies that he needs to make and he would like to apologize for his predecessors. He assures us that we will always be in his prayers, for continued healing and reconciliation. We are glad Father Pat was able to share in the Forgiveness Gift of the Sacred Hoop with us in Red Lake today.
~ Forgiveness Journey Team
A young drummer |
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