Bald Eagle Ceremony in Colorado Goes Awry

This in one case where a lot of good intentions came together in a bad way.  Back on June 4th of this year, the body of a bald eagle was found in a park in Boulder, Colorado.  The eagle’s body was believed to be the result of poaching with the feathers and talons subsequently sold on the black market.  Evidently, this follows a recent trend of poaching bald eagle parts all over the country where the feathers and talons can fetch a high price.  As it turns out, however, this was not the reason for the animals death or mutilation.

As it turns out, a Navajo man, Darrell Pino, had received the body of the eagle from the National Eagle Repository near Denver for use in a ceremony.  Pino had gone through years of paperwork to obtain the animal for use in religious ceremony.  The animal was found by a hiker on the ground near a trail.  The hiker reported the find to the Colorado Division of Wildlife.  Although Pino had wrapped the body of the eagle in a red blanket and placed it inside a sacred tree, it is unclear how the animal ended up on the ground.  My guess is that the red of the blanket may have stood out and someone climbed up there to see what it was, found a dead animal, freaked, and left it on the ground after it fell.  After playing by the rules and jumping through all the proper red tape, Pino was understandably upset:

Pino performed a series of ceremonies over months honoring the eagle and preserving tail feathers and talons for other ritual uses. He then wrapped the eagle’s body in red cloth and placed it in a sacred tree in a ceremony held in May with Lakota elder Lee Plenty Wolf.

“When it first came out, it saddened my heart,” Pino said. “It’s only an animal to you, but to us it’s a relative . . . a direct link to our ancestors — a message to the Creator. This relative was brought down from the tree in a very bad way. I hope that at some point in time, our religion will be respected.”

Although I understand Pino’s frustration and genuine sadness over this event, I do not think that was a case of willful disrespect.  The fault here, in my opinion, lies with communication between the DOW and the National Eagle Repository.  Lets hope that the Colorado Division of Wildlife contacts the National Eagle Repository in the future in such cases.  I also think that Pino needs to be more careful with where he places the body of his birds if he intends on doing the ceremony again sometime in the future.  People simply do not think of Native American ceremonial practices as a first explanation when coming across the body of a mutilated bald eagle.  I never would have myself, although I will in the future.  I am more in line with Myron on this:

Myron Pourier, a tribal official with the Oglala Sioux, or Lakota, of South Dakota, said it isn’t the larger community’s fault it is ignorant of native culture.

“It’s our job in the Lakota nation to educate people about our way,” Pourier said.

To desecrate the grave of a bald eagle is like going to a Christian graveyard and defacing a tombstone, he said.

I am, based unfortunately on past experiences, very careful as to what I leave lying around and pick my ceremonial sites very carefully.  Hopefully this was a good lesson learned all around.

Head Knowledge, Heart Knowledge, and Pagan Reconstructionism.

Within this ongoing dialogue about my own spiritual intentions, I have come to see that I don’t want to “reconstruct” anything.  A Celtic Recon over at Felmac is starting a new online journal about Celtic Reconstructionism (hereafter CR).  I may be getting myself into some trouble here, but as I read through the basic description of the forum I had to shake my head.  Don’t get me wrong here.  I am not trying to slam anybody for their beliefs and spiritual practices.  The following critique is meant to outline why I personally have decided to no longer call myself a Celtic Recon.

“Celtic Reconstructionism is a methodology to restore and revitalize the pre-Christian worldviews and polytheistic systems of the various Celtic peoples in the context of contemporary yet traditional Celtic cultures.”

This is a nice basic description of CR.  I have come to see, however, that for me this is the wrong approach.  Ever since my education in anthropology and my readings of some of the writings of Alexei Kondratiev, I have had to accept that my direct experience of Celtic culture is almost nil.  I am a Coloradoan , and an American.  These are the cultures I was raised in (and I say “cultures” for a reason, trust me growing up in Colorado is totally different from growing up in Missouri for example) and the ones that shape the majority of my cosmology.  Frankly I think it is not realistic, nor honest, for any American to claim Celtic culture nowadays.  We simply don’t know what we are talking about, as we have no direct experience of it.  We can be inspired by Celtic culture and belief, but that is as far as we can go.  That is not to say that for many American families with Irish or Scottish (or Welsh etc.) heritage, that it is not a major influence on them, simply that it is an influence that is biased by Christian belief and culture since the days of Patrick.  This is not a bad thing at all, I point it out simply to counter the idea of many neo-pagans who would like to pretend that the era of Celtic Christianity never happened.  It did.

Native American Sacred Sites: Part III

The last native sacred site that I wish to discuss involves the Hopi tribe of Arizona. A site that, sadly, no longer exists. The Hopi tribe once surrounded their homeland with a series of shrines that aid in communion with the Creator and their kachina allies. The documentary speaks about one of the these shrines literally getting bulldozed in an asphalt mining operation. Since some of these Hopi shrines are now on privately owned land the Hopi have no say over the fate of these shrines. Although they did communicate their concern to the landowner, their pleas fell on the deaf ears that only profits create.

What strikes me as so sad about the destruction of these sacred places is the different value that our “free-market” culture places on the Land. “Raping the land” has become a cliche, but what is a cliche but a succinct truth? The Hopi have been the victims of our never-ending thirst for new resources to exploit, as have many other cultures and of coarse, working class people from all over.

Paganism, and Druidism in particular arises at this time in history for a purpose. That purpose is to help all of humanity learn to value the land in a different way. The heart-felt, unshakable knowledge that the Land is a goddess and the ultimate source of our life; this revelation turns our values towards the welfare of the community and the needs of the Land, not towards a world rampant with the coldness of social Darwinism and individualism at all cost.

One of the most mind blowing books that I have ever read is “The Book of the Hopi” by Frank Waters. I highly recommend it to all pagans and Celts that I meet and respect. The essence of the traditional Hopi worldview is one of voluntary hardship. The traditional Hopi view sees hardship as a continual purification that keeps us healthy in spirit. The Hopi must rely on their prayers for rain, rain to water their crops, crops to feed their families, and families to keep the Hopi alive to see the next dawn. This reliance on ceremony is meant to keep them thankful to their Creator by honoring the Land that sustains them.

Our corporate culture sees the Land in a manner that amounts to suicide. Could it be that Pagans, Druids, Witches, etc. are individuals who hold some of the greatest hope for the future? I like to think so. But are we up to the challenge?

Native American Sacred Sites: Part II

One of the next issues addressed has to do with Devil’s Tower.  A place long been sacred to the Lakota, has also become a place of tension in the last few years.  Once a year the Lakota run around the boundary of the lands that they once held before European contact.  One of the places that they run by is Devil’s Tower.  Devil’s Tower has also traditionally been a place where the Lakota leave offerings, do ceremonies, and make prayers.  The Lakota consider rock climbing on the Tower to be disrespectful.  In cooperation with the Forest Service they have asked rock climbers to stay off the Tower during the month of July.  This is *not* a mandatory ban, but a voluntary one.  Many climbers, however, continue to climb even after the reason for the ban has been explained.  I shake my head and wonder why.

This fight is our fight.  As paganism moves on into the future there will be places on the Land that we too will consider powerful, and worthy of preservation.  One day we too will hope that others will help us when places that are important to us are threatened.  Or will we all end up just turning the other cheek and find somewhere else to go?  If so, I would argue that that place really means nothing to us when the chips are down.  Pagans (Celtic pagans especially) must start asking the question, “What does it mean to be ‘indigenous’ to a place?”.  And we must start to ask our society why it is so hard to stop climbing on someones “Church” for one month out of the year?

When will we as a society stop valuing money over proper stewardship of the Land that gives us life?

Native American Sacred Sites: Part I

Having recently watched an excellent documentary called “In the Light of Reverence: Protecting America’s Sacred Land“, as well as past experience with Ute, Hopi, and Apache sacred land here in Colorado, I wanted to share some personal insights into this *very* complex issue.

I think foremost that it is important for all pagans to remember that we were not in this land first. One of the most disappointing scenes in the film is when they interview a new-age woman who claims that she has as much right to access a spring sacred to the Wintu tribe because “she was once a Native American” in a past life. She then goes on to list the various cultures that she has been a part of in past lives. What angered me about this point off view, is that it is based on a colonial attitude towards other cultures that says, “Hey I can do what I want to any cultural site because I was one of them in a past life.” A ridiculous and arrogant point of view, in my opinion.

The Wintu have been doing ceremony at this particular spring for thousands of years. They were almost wiped out during the California Gold Rush. When the government payed white folk $5 for each Indian head they brought in, effectively reducing their numbers from 12,000 at time of contact to around 400+.  After malaria, head hunting, and a “friendship feast” hosted by white folk in which the food was poisoned it is no wonder that this tribe is small. One of the current members of the Wintu asks a very good and tearful question. “There are a lot of other springs on this mountain, why can’t those people”, referring to Rainbow Gathering members, New-Agers, and Neo-Pagans, “go to one of them?” Indeed, why not?

The Wintu fought a proposed ski-resort that would have effected the spring, and won. In fact, they usually leave the place alone. To many Native tribes it is considered important to leave these sacred places alone. Leaving a place alone is considered a form of respect. The spring, however, is given very little time to be alone, as it’s sacred history has made it a mecca for neo-pagans, and “new-agers” of various ilk. This, in my opinion, is a continuation of cultural genocide on the Wintu. I do *not* think that cultural oppression is the intention of other folk who come to the spring and do ceremony, but ignorance on the impact that it has on Wintu.

I believe it is very important for pagans today to be respectful of these ancient sacred places. For one, the tribe to whom it is sacred has been interacting with that place for thousands of years, they know it and it’s spirits well, very well. To pop on in, do a meditation and think that you know the place fully is, I think, misguided. I look forward to any comments that you may have on this topic. Part II will focus on Devil’s Tower and the Lakota.