Chiron Communiqué

It has been my destiny to travel with many contemporary Native American spiritual elders, and to hear many of the teachings they offer about the land and about the era of transition in which we live. I have just created and published a new Soul*Sparks  ebook — Native Knowings: Wisdom Keys for 2012 and Beyond — in an effort to distill and then to express some of  those wisdom teachings in the context of the year 2012 and the Mayan calendar.

My new ebook has been produced in over 10 formats, so it can be read on any ereader device, including Kindle, Nook, Sony,  iPhones, Blackberries, computers, and so forth. I wrote it short and to the point.

The true scope and depth of Native wisdom is generally unknown, and much of what is known is either drawn from the past, or offered out of context. This Soul*Sparks ebook cannot hope to encompass the many levels and great depth of understanding that are par of Native tradition, but it can hint at them, and it can do so in a manner appropriate for the prophetic year of 2012, and in a context that will endure long after that. Some things — basic spiritual teachings like honesty, sharing, humility, respect, and caring for the land — remain constant through all phases and cycles of human and world development. I reckon the year 2012 will bring no alteration to that.

My aim as writer and compiler is to offer a quintessence of both ancient and contemporary Native wisdom in a coherent, and rhetorically strengthening manner that will be readily accessible for many thousands of people as we confront mounting economic, environmental and social crises in North America, and around the world.

On an August evening about two months ago, Doug George-Kanentiio offered a ten-minute oration while the Sun was setting. Choosing good words, he spoke about the power of great art, about our prophetic era, and about our relations with the land and each other. At the end, he gave voice to the emerging vision of establishing an Indigenous University in America.

The microphone Kanentiio stood at that evening was set on land about twenty-five paces from “Sacred Rain Arrow,” one of the sculptural masterpieces created by the late Allan Houser. Kanentiio’s talk was part of a benefit event for Go Native Arts, hosted in the garden of the Houser Estate about 20 miles south of Santa Fe, New Mexico.

An hour after Kanentiio’s oration, his wife Joanne Shenandoah stood before the same microphone. By this time the stars had emerged, and Jupiter was strong in the sky to the East. Joanne faced south, centered herself, and gave voice to the enthralling Prophecy Song from her Orenda CD. She was supported with harmonies arising from daughter, Leah, and flanked in the West by the beseeching bronze presence of Sacred Rain Arrow.

We are now reminded
to be aware of our place upon this earth.
and to fulfill our obligations to ourselves,
our families, our nations,
the natural world, the Creator.

The words sing, we are to awaken.
Stand up,  Be counted,
for you are being recognized in the Spirit world.

- Joanne Shenandoah – Copyright

Several days after the benefit event, I met Kanentiio again amid a crush of people by the bandstand at the annual Santa Fe Indian Market. We found a quiet place to sit and talk.

To answer my questions about the land, Kanentiio began telling of where he was born and raised, Akwesasne Mohawk Territory on the shores of Kaniatarowanenneh (St. Lawrence River) at the New York-Ontario frontier. The Mohawks are part of the Iroquois Confederacy, and the Keepers of the Eastern Door. Their confederacy is the oldest, active participatory democracy on Earth. With its Great Law of Peace, the Confederacy was a direct example and inspiration for the U.S. Constitution.

A former editor of Akwesasne Notes, Kanentiio is also a founder of the Native American Journalists Association, and the author of several books, including Iroquois on Fire: A Voice from the Mohawk Nation. In collaboration with his wife, Joanne, he is co-author of Skywoman: Tales of the Iroquois.

For many years Kanentiio served on the board of directors for the National Museum of the American Indian, and he is currently serving on the board for the Parliament of the World’s Religions, the largest interfaith gathering on Earth. Steadily growing in scope and influence, the Parliament will reconvene this December in Melbourne, Australia.

As we talked in Santa Fe, Kanentiio reminded me that Mohawk Territory straddles the border between the USA and Canada. It’s territory that’s in both nations, and it’s in neither. “Akwesasne is a nexus,” he said. “It’s situated at a juncture of land and water that is of considerable strategic importance. We straddle the St. Lawrence River at what were once known as the 25-mile rapids.

“Historically at Akwesasne the lives of the people were interwoven with the land and the water. People were called there because the place had all the resources necessary for life, and those resources gave stability to the people and to the community. That provided the Mohawk people with a high degree of cultural continuity, and it gave us a certain power and purpose. We always had that.

“Then in April of 1959 there came a break with this pattern. The St. Lawrence Seaway came into being, and our whole way of life changed. The natural, free flow of the living waters at 25-mile rapids was choked with locks. That energetic change fractured our community. It messed up the fishing grounds, and it separated the people from the water and from the land. We began to metamorphose from a vigorous people to a sedentary people. We became wage earners for the first time, dependent on money, and we began to lose our language. That brought about a huge change in values, and a whole generation of our children began to change from that point onward.

“When traditional indigenous peoples are separated from the land, then there is a break in trust in relation to the land – a break that goes both ways. We don’t trust the land, and the land doesn’t trust us. But you must have that trust. When we don’t communicate with each other, and when we don’t communicate with the land, the relationships become abrasive.”

In this context, Kanentiio mentioned Handsome Lake (Ganyahdiyok), the legendary figure who brought Gaiwiio (Good Words) to the people over 200 years ago. Among his life experiences, Handsome Lake was given a vision of the future. He foresaw environmental disasters including air and water pollution, and he offered prophetic cautions.

“Handsome Lake and others warned us that the final assault on the Iroquois – the greatest danger – would come from within. That’s what’s happening now,” Kanentiio said. “In terms of ideals, the Iroquois Confederacy represents something very good. But things change. Metamorphosis has continued and is continuing today, but at a faster pace. In our tradition we have in our creation story an important part about the twins, one twin of the good mind and one twin of the bad mind. That’s something to remember. These twins are always present.”

“Smuggling of tobacco and narcotics, and gambling — whatever commands a profit — has created a narco-culture at Akwesasne,” he said. “Our good, traditional Iroquois values of humility, compassion, simplicity, generosity and communal service have been replaced by greed, intimidation, violence, and death.”

After hearing this, I told Kanentiio of a meeting that happened about 17 years ago in Montreal. I found myself sitting beside the late Hopi messenger Thomas Banyacya in a hotel lobby after he had given a talk. As we conversed, Grandfather Banyacya told me that long ago, when the Earth had gone through another epic metamorphosis, gambling had been the precipitating factor. “That was the last straw,” Banyacya told me. “When the gambling and all its related problems built up to a certain level, that triggered the great flood that cleansed the land.”

After listening to my story, Kanentiio responded. “We Indian people are supposed to be the custodians of the land, but what we are doing now is running casinos. We are sidetracked. We have lost sight of what we are supposed to do. The bright, shiny thing along the path has enticed many of the people to become lost, to lose track. Handsome Lake warned of that a long time ago, and now it’s everywhere.

“The Earth is beginning to stir,” he said. “She’s beginning to express the dreams and visions of long ago. The Earth is showing us that she’s increasingly upset with us. The Earth is beginning to arouse. There will be huge changes in this time of reckoning, of healing, until the balance is restored. We are very close now. It won’t be subtle. Big winds will come. The Earth will shrug its shoulders.

“We are not able to change this movement toward purification,” Kanentiio said, “but we know some things will survive. The Confederacy will endure in spite of itself. That is a shared understanding among traditionals, that despite all the odds the Confederacy will survive and go on, as the larger world will also go on in a new way.

“People feel the urgency of the changes now, and many are motivated to do things. That’s good. Preserve what you can. You have to leave something good and tangible behind.

A particular thing that Kanentiio would like to help leave behind is an Indigenous University for North America.

“A few years ago, Vine Deloria, Jr. thought maybe we could take the system of formal education, which had been used to undermine traditional native societies, and reverse it’s impact by creating our own institution based on the university system,” Kanentiio said. “We would create a formal, accredited university where native knowledge keepers would have a place to teach.

“We have native colleges, but an Indigenous University could in time meet and exceed universal standards for learning, and provide formal instruction in all native arts and sciences, of which there are many.  It would have a high emphasis on online study. That’s a dream of ours.”

The Indigenous University would be open to everybody on the planet, no restrictions of race or religion. ”That is typical Iroquois,” Kanentiio explained. “Our way is to make it possible that people come to a meeting of the good mind. To get there, you need to sit in respect with one another. You have to invite people from all walks of life and viewpoints to share information, and you have to listen to one another.

“We have the ideas to create an Indigenous University,” he said. “What we need now are the physical and financial means to bring it about.”

In a related effort to weave indigenous viewpoints into the world’s larger framework, Kanentiio and Joanne — as well as other native peoples from North America and around the world — have become involved with the Parliament of World Religions. “We have in part managed to get the Parliament to adopt a native perspective on the Earth: to regard the Earth not as a commodity, but as a being.”

Kanentiio serves on the board of directors for the Parliament. He noted that the theme of their December, meeting will be ‘Reconciling with Mother Earth.’  “My hope for this Parliament,” he said, “is that teachers from world’s various disciplines, Jews, Evangelical Christians, Hindus, Muslims, Roman Catholics, and many more — can get together again in Melbourne and finally acknowledge that Earth is a living planet and should have standing. If spiritual leaders accept that, and take these spiritual understandings to their nations and congregations to make it a guiding principle, then that’s a good thing.

“We feel the real revolution in human society will come about through these spiritual changes,” Kanentiio said. “It has to happen there first, on the spiritual level. Once we change the spiritual, then the politics will follow.

“For me,” he said, “the roots of this understanding go back to our Iroquois value that all human beings have equal worth, if not necessarily equal abilities. Everyone’s life has meaning. Some are singers and healers, and some are cooks or builders, but each one of us has the blessings of existence. To cultivate this, to acknowledge, to have gratitude for being alive. You can always do that. Our lives are not casual, not by chance. We have been directed here to this time and place, and we are meant to take all of our life experiences with us, all the joys, suffering, and pain, and to take it with us with good mind when we return to the place of living light. That makes the light stronger for the generations to come.”

Author’s Note: Many of the themes articulated in this story are also explored in my epic, nonfiction saga of North America in this era of transition, Odyssey of the 8th Fire. – S. McFadden

An authoritative new study sets out a grim vision of what lies ahead: climate change will cause shortages and violence, provoking much of civilization to collapse.

This blunt warning is the heart of the 2009 State of the Future study from the UN’s Millennium Project. The report, which will be made public in August, is based on the input of 2,700 researchers, and backed by a range of organizations including UNESCO, the World Bank, and the US Army.

According to the report, “The scope and scale of the future effects of climate change – ranging from changes in weather patterns to loss of livelihoods and disappearing states – has unprecedented implications for political and social stability.”

The immediate problems are rising food and energy prices, shortages of water and increasing migrations “due to political, environmental and economic conditions,” which could plunge half the world into social instability and violence.

The report suggests the threats could also engender wise and healthy responses. “The good news is that the global financial crisis and climate change planning may be helping humanity to move from its often selfish, self-centered adolescence to a more globally responsible adulthood…Many perceive the current economic disaster as an opportunity to invest in the next generation of greener technologies…and to put the world on course for a better future.”

What is good and healthy and helpful?

Leon Secatero

Reading the stark forecasts from this report put me in mind – thankfully — of someone I knew and admired, the late Leon Secatero of the Canoncito Band of Navajo, To’Hajiilee, New Mexico. Whenever Leon would hear pronouncements of inevitable doom, he would acknowledge the potential, then respond calmly.

In one of our conversations back in 2005, Grandfather Leon spoke with me about the future. “The journey we are beginning now is for the next 500 years. What will be the sacred path that people will walk over the next 500 years? Even in the midst of all the changes taking place and all the things falling apart, we are building that foundation now. That’s something important for us to remember and to focus on. If we don’t do it, no one else will.

“All anyone needs to do is look around,” Leon said. “We have been destroying nature systematically for many decades. Now nature is destroying us with winds and storms and earthquakes and volcanoes. All that was known a long time ago. The elders have been telling us for years that this would come. Now it’s here and it’s hurting us.

“We need to take a close look at this and then really come to terms with ourselves,” Leon said. “To move ahead into the next 500 years we must leave some things behind or they will contaminate or even eliminate the future. We cannot go forward if we keep destroying the earth. But we must also ask, what is good and healthy and helpful? Those good things can be part of our foundation, part of our pathway into the next 500 years…”

There is a growing cohort of people who are actively asking these questions, and responding creatively. I have come to think of them as the Millennial Agrarians, and they got a nod of acknowledgement this week from USA Today.

In the story, reporter Elizabeth Weise wrote “Agriculture specialists say there is a burgeoning movement in which young people — most of whom come from cities and suburbs — are taking up what may be the world’s oldest profession: organic farming.

“The wave of young farmers on tiny farms is too new and too small to have turned up significantly in USDA statistics, but people in the farming world acknowledge there’s something afoot.

“For these new farmers, going back to the land isn’t a rejection of conventional society, but an embrace of growing crops and raising animals for market as an honorable, important career choice.”

In the face of the grim vision described by the researchers involved with the State of the Future report, these Millennial Agrarians are an embodiment of hope. We are going to need millions more people – perhaps as many as 80 to 100 million more – to face what is happening in our world, and to respond intelligently to the call of the land.

(For more on this theme, including many more creative responses, see my blog at The Call of the Land.).

My old friend and teacher, Grandfather William Commanda, Ojigkwnong, now age 95, will soon have another vital meeting with officials of the Canadian Government concerning his vision for Victoria Island (Asinabka).

Like the other key visions which have punctuated Grandfather’s life, the vision for an international healing center at Victoria Island has profound global importance.

Victoria Island is a jewel of nature, strategically located in the middle of the river that runs through downtown Ottawa, Canada’s capital city, under the shadow of Parliament Hill, where the government of Canada meets.  For countless centuries, Victoria Island was a traditional spiritual meeting ground for the Algonquin peoples.

Grandfather envisions returning the island to its spiritual purpose by establishing an inclusive City Park, a Historic Interpretative Site, and International Peace Center at the Sacred Site of Asinabka -Chaudière Falls. The center would host programs and processes for individual, group, and planetary healing, development and peace.

Grandfather Commanda is the senior Algonquin Elder in this territory. Since 1970, he has been the Keeper of three sacred wampum belts of spiritual and historic importance: the Seven Fires Prophecy Belt, the 1701 Friendship Belt and the Jay Treaty Border Crossing Belt.

I first met Grandfather in 1989 when I interviewed him for my book, Profiles in Wisdom: Native Elders Speak About the Earth. We then became closer friends in the mid-1990s as we participated in a prophetic and historic walk from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific – The Sunbow 5 Walk for the Earth (Odyssey of the 8th Fire).

Over the decades, Grandfather has earned wide international respect as a visionary and healer. Most recently – May, 2009 – he was honored by being invested as an Officer of the Order of Canada by the Governor General of Canada. The Order of Canada is the centerpiece of Canada’s honors system and recognizes a lifetime of outstanding achievement, dedication to the community and service to the nation.

Grandfather and his friends have been working for over ten years to develop the vision for Victoria Island, and now, in 2009, they feel the time is right to take another big step forward.

Many people and groups –  Algonquin and non-Algonquin, from Canada, the U.S.A. and a host of other nations — have written to the Canadian Prime Minister, and other government officials, seeking to have this vision realized. More letters and expressions of support are needed and welcome now.

Victoria Island served as an important sacred ceremonial place for the original peoples of the land. It seems the land has been waiting for the ancient communal fires to be re-kindled..

With Grandfather Commanda’s vision to build a peace and healing center, comes an opportunity to cleanse and reawaken the land, to ignite the fires for a circle of all nations, and to help spark a culture of peace. Meegwich.

Chaudiere Falls at Victoria Island, Ottawa, Canada

As has happened frequently over the last two decades, the Eagle and the Condor will soon fly together once again as ancient teachings unfold, joined in the spirit of our times by the Quetzal.

The joining point is set for April 18-28, 2009, in Northern Arizona, where elders of Native nations from North, South and Central America will come together in one circle, with people of all the colors and all the spiritual pathways, as was long ago foreseen.

The historic, international, multicultural gathering called Return of the Ancestors will also mark the 4th reunion of the Continental Council of Indigenous Elders and Spiritual Guides of the Americas.

Maya Kiche spiritual leader Grandfather Alejandro Cirilo Oxlaj, President of this Council, and also the official Ambassador Extraordinary Itinerant of the Council of Indigenous Peoples of Guatemala, will preside at the gatherings. He has observed that with only four years left to the Mayan Calendar, many people have been stirred to fear the end of the world. The calendar is not predicting the end of the world in 2012, he says, but rather the start of a new era. The April gathering in Arizona is intended to help usher in this new era.

This gathering is fulfilling great prophecies of the North, South and Center. As articulated by don Alejandro, “We have been waiting over 500 years. Our Mayan prophecy says ‘those of the Center (Quetzal) may unite the Eagle of the North with the Condor of the South. We will meet, for we are one like the fingers of the hand. When the Eagle once again flies with the Condor, the Earth will awaken. A lasting peace will unfold in the Americas and will spread throughout the world to unite humanity.”

Beginning on Earth Day in April, the Return of the Ancestors gathering will include Indigenous Elders and Future Wisdom Keepers from every region of the globe, from the highest peaks of the Andes Mountains to the Plains of Africa. They are coming to share their insights and teachings and to help create new guidestone tablets for the upcoming 500 years. The gathering will share a harvest of wisdom and understandings with the intent of helping enable the world to move forward in respect and honor.

This gathering’s commitment to the focal point of ceremony, offers pilgrims of the world – all colors and all spiritual pathways — the opportunity to witness councils focused on sharing wisdom from the ancestors, as well as to participate in songs and sacred ceremonies.

Adam Yellowbird and the private, non-profit Institute for Cultural Awareness will serve as host for Return of the Ancestors. To learn more about how to support or participate, contact ICA directly at 928-646-3000 or visit their website.

Two reports this week underscore the need for families, neighborhoods, and communities to take action this year to ensure their ongoing food security. Because evidence for this need is mounting, I am cross-posting this entry from my agrarian blog, The Call of the Land. That site reports not only on the calls arising from the land, but also on innovative and sustainable ways people are responding.

The first report is somewhat longer in term. The head of the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), acknowledged on Monday that global food production is already under strain from the global credit crunch — must double by 2050 to head off mass famine.

Jacques Diouf said that the unfolding global food crisis pushed another 40 million people into hunger in 2008. That brought the global number of undernourished people to 973 million last year out of a total population of around 6.5 billion, he said.

“We face the challenge now of not only ensuring food for the 973 million who are currently hungry,” Diouf said, “but also ensuring there is food for nine billion people in 2050. We will need to double global food production by 2050.”

Diouf warned the global economic crisis was already undermining efforts to tackle food insecurity. The credit crisis makes it harder for farmers to get loans to buy materials and equipment to grow crops.

“This silent tsunami is completely unacceptable,” Diouf said of the mounting global food crisis.

Meanwhile, of more immediate concern, consumers may soon be paying even more as they chase a shrinking supply of fresh and frozen vegetables. According to news reports, many California farmers have started abandoning their fields in response to a crippling drought.

California’s sweeping Central Valley grows most of the country’s fruits and vegetables. But this winter thousands of acres are turning to dust as the state hurtles into the worst drought in nearly two decades. The consequences of the drought will soon impact store shelves and consumer wallets.

The credit crisis, ongoing instability in the realm of oil prices, the drought, and other mounting conditions make it important now – this year – for citizens to take steps to implement local and sustainable systems of food production.