Category: Quaker

Resist

Resistance is a powerful concept.

As I pray and learn about atrocities and injustices, the courage of resisters in all struggles, through all time, inspire me.

My own first experience with resistance came when I was 18 years old and faced the decision regarding registering for the draft (Selective Service System). The stories of, the example of many Quaker men I knew, helped me immensely to decided to resist the draft. My friend and Quaker mentor, Don Laughlin, collected stories of Quaker resistance: Young Quaker Men Face War and Conscription

It was an act of resistance when we walked and camped along the route of the Dakota Access pipeline, from Des Moines to Fort Dodge, Iowa, for a week in 2018. You can read the many stories, and see the photos of this sacred journey here.
First Nation-Farmer Unity – First Nation peoples and farmers working together (firstnationfarmer.com)

I spent many years resisting other fossil fuel pipelines, including the Keystone XL pipeline. And was peripherally involved with the Wet’suwet’en peoples’ resistance to the Coastal GasLink pipeline.

Now I am involved with those who are resisting colonial capitalism and white supremacy. As we build Mutual Aid communities. As we work for LANDBACK.

I don’t know what I will write each morning, as I wait in quiet and pray. The following poem triggered this today.

Resist

Brandy Nālani McDougall

Qawem ya sha’abi, qawemhum. Resist my people, resist them.
—Dareen Tatour

Hawaiians are still here. We are still creating, still resisting.
—Haunani-Kay Trask



Stand in rage as wind and current clash
                                       rile lightning and thunder
fire surge and boulder crash

         Let the ocean eat and scrape away these walls
Let the sand swallow their fences whole
                       Let the air between us split the atmosphere

We have no land             No country
             But we have these bodies              these stories
this language of rage                    left 

                 This resistance is bitter
and tastes like medicine                 Our lands 
               replanted in the dark and warm             there

We unfurl our tangled roots                stretch
                             to blow salt across
             blurred borders of memory  

             They made themselves
fences and bullets             checkpoints 
gates and guardposts                           martial law

They made themselves
            hotels and mansions         adverse 
possession             eminent domain and deeds

                   They made themselves 
                                                       shine 
                                           through the plunder

They say we can never— They say 
                           we will never—because
            because they— 

            and the hills and mountains have been 
mined for rock walls                    the reefs 
            pillaged for coral floors

They say we can never—
                           and the deserts and dunes have been
shoveled and taken for their houses and highways—

                because we can never— because 
the forests have been raided                      razed 
and scorched and we                                 we the wards

refugees          houseless          present-
absentees       recognition refusers        exiled
uncivilized       disposable        natives

protester-activist-terrorist-resisters—
               our springs and streams have been
dammed—so they say we can never return

                       let it go accept this 
progress         stop living
            in the past—

but we make ourselves
         strong enough to carry all of our dead
                engrave their names in the clouds

We gather to sing whole villages awake 
        We crouch down to eat rocks like fruit
                 to hold the dirt the sand in our hands 

to fling words 
           the way fat drops of rain 
                   splatter off tarp or corrugated roofs

We remember the sweetness                We rise from the plunder
           They say there is no return                             
                   they never could really make us leave

Copyright © 2021 by Brandy Nālani McDougall. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on July 23, 2021, by the Academy of American Poets.

“‘Resist’ was inspired by Palestinian poet Dareen Tatour’s courage to stand against the ongoing Israeli occupation of Palestinian land and ethnic cleansing of her people. In 2015, for the poetic line ‘Qawem ya sha’abi, qawemhum’ (Resist, my people, resist them), she was imprisoned on charges of ‘incitement to violence’ and sentenced to five months in jail and years under house arrest. This poem ‘Resist’ reflects on both the militarized violence and creative decolonial connections between Palestine and Hawaiʻi, which was an independent country prior to the U.S. military-backed overthrow in 1893 and the subsequent illegal annexation to the U.S. in 1898. Our own continued struggle as Kānaka ʻŌiwi includes protecting our lands and waters from U.S. military bases and testing, bombing, dumping, housing, and recreational sites, and protecting our people from related health hazards, poverty, and hopelessness. We will forever resist the destruction of our homelands and how they are being used to test weapons that bring horrific violence to others. I intend ‘Resist’ to be a poem of solidarity for the Palestinian people.”

Brandy Nālani McDougall

From Apology to Action

Truth and Reconciliation Commission – From Apology to Action
CFSC (Quakers) Indigenous Rights Icon Small

In 2007 the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC) was established as part of the legal settlement of the largest class-action lawsuit in Canadian history. The TRC’s mandate was:

to learn the truth about what happened in the residential schools and to inform all Canadians about what happened in the schools. The Commission will document the truth of what happened by relying on records held by those who operated and funded the schools, testimony from officials of the institutions that operated the schools, and experiences reported by survivors, their families, communities and anyone personally affected by the residential school experience and its subsequent impacts.

In 2015 the TRC released its report including 94 Calls to Action which we urge all Canadians to read and strive towards in the ongoing process of reconciliation.

At Canadian Yearly Meeting in 2011 Canadian Friends approved this minute:

We are being invited by the Indigenous peoples of Canada as represented by the Indian Residential School Survivors, through the Indian Residential School Survivors Settlement Agreement, to enter a journey of truth finding and reconciliation. We encourage all Friends, in their Meetings for Worship and Monthly and Regional Meetings, boldly to accept this invitation and to engage locally, regionally and nationally, actively seeking ways to open ourselves to this process.

CFSC was honoured to witness and participate in the closing events of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada. Watch a clip from this powerful and important closing below:

We welcomed the report and Calls to Action of the TRC as deeply important for genuine reconciliation. Together with our partners we’ve also called on the Government of Canada to follow the lead of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

CFSC has produced a resource for Quakers and others who wish to engage with the TRC Calls to Action.

https://quakerservice.ca/TRCGuide
Truth and Reconciliation: Quakers in Action. (PDF)

We encourage you to make use of this resource and are happy to help, so feel free to contact us!

Intertwined threads

Writing is a spiritual practice for me. Sitting at the computer, I try to quiet my mind to hear what I should write. In times past a writer would sit in front of a blank page. This morning there are intertwined threads.

There are many reasons news of the remains of Native children profoundly affects me.

My career began with five years in neonatal intensive care. The rest doing research at that children’s hospital. I was blessed to be immersed with children everyday. I attempt to retain childlike qualities. Children are my heroes. I love the idea of children as sacred beings.

In almost every indigenous language of what is now known as the Americas there is a word for children that translates to English as sacred beings. Acknowledging in thoughts, words and actions that our children are sacred beings provides not only the necessary healthy intention and consciousness that will benefit our children; this acknowledgement reminds us as parents to once again be open with our own hearts.

Knowing children as sacred beings brings forth a healthy and healing strength of humility from within us as parents and adults. The youth are our teachers with a profound message for this world. When we as parents and adults acknowledge the Sacredness within ourselves it becomes difficult to not acknowledge this within others – especially our children. We have all been manifested as sacred beings, and although we are able to forget, we are unable to change the truth of what we have been created as, and always will be.

For parents who struggle to see themselves as sacred beings, simply allow your children to remind you of what you’ve forgotten. At birth through their newborn cries the children sing a song to their parents and the world. At this very moment hundreds of sacred beings, answered prayers, messengers of light are manifesting in all cultures and languages. They’re all entering this world singing a song of a sacred contract that can never be broken, only temporarily forgotten. The children’s song is reminding us. Listen…

Raising Sacred Beings,  by Anthony Goulet, The Good Men Project. August 29, 2014

One of this morning’s threads relates to brutal honesty. I’ve often thought of the following quote. I haven’t always been but will try to be brutally honest in what follows.

Being brutally honest does not necessarily mean you are correct.

Well, I have to tell you something, and you may not like to hear it. But if you struggle with the art of being frank, you need to hear this. It will make you a better person, a better communicator and a better blogger.
So here it is …
You’re a coward.
If you can’t be brutally honest with people, especially when you know it’s in their best interest, you’re a coward.
You’re not doing anyone a favor by withholding a truth from them, even if it’s difficult for them to hear.
The only person you’re protecting is yourself. Because you’re afraid of the consequences to you.
But it’s not about you.
Being honest is about making sure your audience has the information they need to make good decisions. That includes information they may not like.

THE BRUTALLY HONEST GUIDE TO BEING BRUTALLY HONEST by Josh Tucker, SmartBlogger,Jan 30, 2019

I’ve stepped away from the Quaker community that has supported my spiritual life, my whole life. I’m not certain this is not just an emotional response to the atrocities of forced assimilation. I continue to pray to see if this is a true spiritual leading.

I wonder if I can remain a Quaker.

For the past several years I have been led to opportunities to become friends with a number of Native people. It takes much more than attending conferences or powwows or serving on committees to accomplish this. One opportunity was walking and camping for 94 miles along the path of the Dakota Access pipeline with a small group of native and non-native people. Through experiences like that, I’ve been blessed to come to some understandings through a gentle process of integration. But I am just at the beginning of this journey.

The word En’owkin in the Okanagan language elicits the metaphorical image of liquid being absorbed drop by single drop through the head (mind). It refers to coming to understanding through a gentle process of integration.

Jeanette Armstrong

What follows are generalities. But my understanding, expressed as brutally honestly as I can. When I refer to Quakers I mean white Quakers in the lands called the United States and Canada. That distinction is necessary because much relates to white supremacy.

  • Indigenous peoples have always lived in balance with nature.
  • Quakers are not and should immediately do everything possible to stop using fossil fuels.
  • We should immediately ramp up installation of local renewable energy sources.
  • Environmental chaos will only worsen. Extremely rapidly.
  • Indigenous ways are the only way to slow down the impending chaos.
  • I have grown spiritually from my experiences with Indigenous peoples. In ways I hadn’t as a Quaker.
  • White Quakers are too integrated into the culture of white supremacy and capitalism.
  • Friends need to understand how white culture continues to oppress and interfere with our relationships with black, Indigenous and other people of color (BIPOC).
  • Friends should be physically present in BIPOC communities so healing and reconciliation can occur.  To understanding through a gentle process of integration.
  • Friends should literally be on the front lines of BIPOC actions for justice.
  • Quakers should reject vertical hierarchies of power. Vertical hierarchies are the only way White supremacy can exist.
  • An alternative is Mutual Aid which is based upon a flat hierarchy. Quakers should participate in, and create Mutual Aid communities.
  • Quakers should learn about and participate in Land Back. The model for returning to Indigenous practices for community and stewardship of the land.
  • Hundreds of thousands of Native children were forcibly taken from their families to institutions of assimilation.
  • Thousands of children died in those schools, or during their escape.
  • Quakers were involved in various ways in forced assimilation.
  • Quakers should discern a response and act on it now. This is urgent. Rapidly increasing numbers of children found is devastating Indigenous communities. Should be devastating to Quakers.

In our way we are always told not to ask for anything. We are always told in our community, as a practice, that when we have to start asking for something, that’s when we’re agreeing that people be irresponsible. Irresponsible in not understanding what we’re needing, irresponsible in not seeing what’s needed, and irresponsible in not having moved our resources and our actions to make sure that need isn’t there, because this is the responsibility that we, and the people that surround us, mutually bear. So in our community we cannot go to a person and say, “I want you to do this for me.” All we can do is clarify for them what is happening and what the consequences are for our family, or for our community, or for the land. We must clarify for them what needs to be done and how it needs to be done, and then it is up to them and if they fall short of that responsibility, at some point they will face the same need themselves.

Indigenous Knowledge and Gift Giving by Jeanette Armstrong, syndicated from gift-economy.com, Jul 13, 2021

The website LANDBack Friends has many resources to help Quakers learn more about, and how to do these things. https://landbackfriends.com/

I have tried to clarify for Quakers what needs to be done and how it needs to be done, and then it is up to them and if they fall short of that responsibility, at some point they will face the same need themselves.

I thought of this photo I took yesterday when I read coming to understanding through a gentle process of integration in the quote above. The image was basically black, but by the gentle process of editing, the shapes and rainbows of colors emerged.

Gentile process of integration. Jeff Kisling

Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings 2

Yesterday I wrote of my conflicts with Quakers, which stem from lack of response to atrocities of institutions of forced assimilation. Which Quakers had been involved with.

Native organizations are not asking us to judge our Quaker ancestors. They are asking, “Who are Friends today? Knowing what we know now, will Quakers join us in honest dialogue? Will they acknowledge the harm that was done? Will they seek ways to contribute toward healing processes that are desperately needed in Native communities?”

Paula Palmer

Will Quakers join us in honest dialogue?

Yesterday’s post included conflict resolution ground rules from Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings: Poems by Joy Harjo. Following she discusses skills to enhance mutual trust and respect.

2. USE EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION SKILLS THAT DISPLAY AND ENHANCE MUTUAL TRUST AND RESPECT:

  • If you sign this paper we will become brothers. We will no longer fight. We will give you this land and these waters “as long as the grass shall grow and the rivers run.”
  • The lands and waters they gave us did not belong to them to give. Under false pretenses we signed. After drugging by drink, we signed. With a mass of gunpower pointed at us, we signed. With a flotilla of war ships at our shores, we signed. We are still signing. We have found no peace in this act of signing.
  • A casino was raised up over the gravesite of our ancestors. Our own distant cousins pulled up the bones of grandparents, parents, and grandchildren from their last sleeping place. They had forgotten how to be human beings. Restless winds emerged from the earth when the graves were open and the winds went looking for justice.
  • If you raise this white flag of peace, we will honor it.
  • At Sand Creek several hundred women, children, and men were slaughtered in an unspeakable massacre, after a white flag was raised. The American soldiers trampled the white flag in the blood of the peacemakers.
  • There is a suicide epidemic among native children. It is triple the rate of the rest of America. “It feels like wartime,” said a child welfare worker in South Dakota.
  • If you send your children to our schools we will train them to get along in this changing world. We will educate them.
  • We had no choice. They took our children. Some ran away and froze to death. If they were found they were dragged back to the school and punished. They cut their hair, took away their language, until they became as strangers to themselves even as they became strangers to us.
  • If you sign this paper we will become brothers. We will no longer fight. We will give you this land and these waters in exchange “as long as the grass shall grow and the rivers run.”
  • Put your hand on this bible, this blade, this pen, this oil derrick, this gun and you will gain trust and respect with us. Now we can speak together as one.
  • We say, put down your papers, your tools of coercion, your false promises, your posture of superiority and sit with us before the fire. We will share food, songs, and stories. We will gather beneath starlight and dance, and rise together at sunrise.
  • White House, or Chogo Hvtke, means the house of the peacekeeper, the keepers of justice. We have crossed this river to speak to the white leader for peace many times since these settlers first arrived in our territory and made this their place of governance.
  • These streets are our old trails, curved to fit around trees.

Harjo, Joy. Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings: Poems. W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.

That is the opposite of mutual trust and respect. Particularly related to the remains of thousands of Native children on the grounds of institutions of forced assimilation.

Quakers should support Indigenous leadership. Show up. Follow Native social media sites. Attend events posted there.

I follow the Great Plains Action Society. And am part of Des Moines Mutual Aid, which is supported by Great Plains Action Society, including involvement of my friend Ronnie James, an Indigenous organizer.

The website LANDBack Friends has information about these things, including An Epistle to Friends Regarding Community, Mutual Aid and LANDBACK

Friends should not add to the burden of Indigenous peoples. Instead find events such as the above, and show up for support. But do NOT try to offer suggestions, etc.

A focus of Great Plains Action Society is stop whitewashing the truth.

Conflict Resolution 1

How can I work through conflict with my Quaker community? What is the conflict? How resolved?

Fundamentally, what is the relationship between spirituality and how we live our lives?

I agree with my friends Alton and Foxy Onefeather, “Earth is my church”.

Alton and Foxy Onefeather

That is why I’ve had lifelong tensions with Quakers about burning fossil fuels. I was able to live without a car in Indianapolis because of a city bus system, bicycling and running. With no mass transit in rural Iowa, Friends do what they can. It is humbling to now live in a small city with no public transit, to need to use a car sometimes.

Unresolved conflicts have an immediacy by definition. Something is being done now that causes conflict. Our spirituality guides us through our own conflicts. But what do we do when we see others acting in ways we disagree with? How do we deal with what our ancestors might have done?

How we live our lives should be an example. We hope this might encourage others to change. But need to consider we might be wrong. We can discuss our differences but should not try to force change. I’ve done that.

Several weeks ago I felt a strong leading to stop attending my Quaker meeting. It has been difficult. I didn’t want to.

I’ve been praying about why, and when I can return. Historically Friends who had strong leadings, for example about enslavement, worked within Quaker communities.

My current conflict is an overwhelming grief at news of the discovery of the remains of hundreds, soon to be thousands, of Native children on the grounds of residential institutions of forced assimilation. I feel this in ways I would not have several years ago, before I was blessed to begin to know and work with my Native friends. I have spoken to each of them about Quaker involvement in forced assimilation early in our relationships. We could not have moved into deeper relationship if this truth was not spoken.

One of my good friends told me he is trying to not let rage get in the way of his mourning. I have met his son and cannot imagine their discussions about this.

As I was praying about conflict, I remembered Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings: Poems by Joy Harjo. I’m surprised how the following gets to the root of the conflicts I feel now.

1 . SET CONFLICT RESOLUTION GROUND RULES:

  • Recognize whose lands these are on which we stand.
  • Ask the deer, turtle, and the crane.
  • Make sure the spirits of these lands are respected and treated with goodwill.
  • The land is a being who remembers everything.
  • You will have to answer to your children, and their children, and theirs—
  • The red shimmer of remembering will compel you up the night to walk the perimeter of truth for understanding.
  • As I brushed my hair over the hotel sink to get ready I heard:
  • By listening we will understand who we are in this holy realm of words.
  • Do not parade, pleased with yourself.
  • You must speak in the language of justice.

Harjo, Joy. Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings: Poems. W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.

To this day we have not come to grips with fundamental injustices our country was built on, the cultural genocide and theft of land from Native Americans, the enslavement of African Americans and the legal justifications of bestowing rights and privileges on white land-owning men. The consequences of these injustices continue to plague our society today. And will continue to impact us until we do what is necessary to bring these injustices to light and find ways to heal these wounds.

Several Friends recently assisted Boulder Meeting Friend, Paula Palmer, to lead workshops and discussions as part of her ministry “toward right relationships with Native people.” Part of the tragedy of the theft of Native land is that some Native people don’t have the concept of land as property, belonging to a landowner. Rather they have a spiritual connection to Mother Earth, that the land is sacred and not something that can be claimed as property by anyone. Being forced to leave their land broke their spiritual bonds with the land.

Native people have asked us to begin work toward reconciliation and healing. The first step needed is truth telling, recognizing that injury or harm has taken place. One of the important parts of holding “right relationship” workshops is to determine which Native nations were on the land before white settlers arrived.

Iowa Yearly Meeting (Conservative) 2019

Tensions between Native peoples and Christian religions

There is growing sorrow and anger in Indigenous communities now. Related to the awful and expanding discoveries of the remains of children, thousands of them, found on the grounds of former Native residential schools.

A good friend told me he is trying to not let rage get in the way of his mourning. I know his son, and can’t imagine the conversations they might have had about this news.

It is so traumatic to imagine the terror of the children, who had to know about at least some of these deaths at their school. To have been abused in so many ways. Punished if they spoke their language. Not even be allowed their practices that might give comfort. Alone, isolated from their families. Knowing they could die themselves.

Interior Secretary Deb Haaland announced Tuesday that she is launching the Federal Indian Boarding School Truth Initiative, a first-of-its-kind comprehensive review of the “devastating history” of the U.S. government’s policy of forcing Native American children into boarding schools for assimilation into white culture.

Deb Haaland Launches Review of ‘Devastating’ Native American Boarding Schools. The Interior Department probe will identify Indigenous children who died at schools the U.S. government forced them into for assimilation into white culture By Jennifer Bendery, HuffPost, June 22, 2021

Quakers were involved in some of these schools. Not to say they mistreated the children. But the concept of trying to assimilate Native children into white culture is by definition cultural genocide.

What is our accountability today?

From our twenty-first-century vantage point, we know (or can learn) how Native people suffered and continue to suffer the consequences of actions that Friends committed 150 ago with the best of intentions. Can we hold those good intentions tenderly in one hand, and in the other hold the anguish, fear, loss, alienation, and despair borne by generations of Native Americans?

Native organizations are not asking us to judge our Quaker ancestors. They are asking, “Who are Friends today? Knowing what we know now, will Quakers join us in honest dialogue? Will they acknowledge the harm that was done? Will they seek ways to contribute toward healing processes that are desperately needed in Native communities?” These are my questions, too.

Quaker Indian Boarding Schools. Facing Our History and Ourselves By Paula Palmer, Friends Journal, October 1, 2016

I belong to the spiritual communities of Quakers and of my Native friends. There is great tension between these communities. The article below, “why we’re burning Bibles” describes a Native view of Christian religions. This was written by the Great Plains Action Society, where I have many friends. I am sure some Friends will object to these ideas. But we don’t have the right to pass judgement.

This is a confusing time for me. I’ve been learning and telling others about the Native boarding schools for years. I have spoken about this and apologized to each of my Native friends for the Quaker involvement in the residential schools.

Below is an Epistle to Friends Regarding Community, Mutual Aid and LANDBACK in which I write more about these things. My Native friends tell me the best way I can help them is by teaching others about the concepts of LANDBACK. So I’ve recently created the website LANDBACK Friends. There is a lot of information about the Native boarding schools there.

When I began to learn of the verification of the remains of Native children at those schools, I wondered how that might affect how Native peoples view Quakers, view me now. I am touched by them telling me I am still welcome to work with them.

Native organizations are not asking us to judge our Quaker ancestors. They are asking, “Who are Friends today? Knowing what we know now, will Quakers join us in honest dialogue? Will they acknowledge the harm that was done? Will they seek ways to contribute toward healing processes that are desperately needed in Native communities?”

Paula Palmer

Why We’re Burning Bibles

Stand with First Nations Peoples on Cancel KKKanada Day and burn your bibles for the rape, torture, and murder of Indigenous children. Use #bibleburner and post your video or pic online or on the event page.

https://www.greatplainsaction.org/single-post/why-we-re-burning-bibles?

In the wake of over 1300 unmarked/mass graves that have recently been uncovered on reservations such as the Cowessess and Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nations in Canada, we demand truth, justice, and healing from genocidal policy set forth by the US and Canada that allowed Christian clergy to neglect, rape, torture, and murder Indigenous children. We also demand redress and reparations to the fullest extent as we know that there are thousands of Indigenous children also buried here in the US—and the search hasn’t even begun.

For now, we will start by expelling the codified christian text that is the blueprint behind our genocide. The Christian bible has proven to be the deadliest of all human-made weapons. It has been the permission slip for all of the atrocities following colonization. The cost of building the global Christian Empire is an ongoing and immeasurable loss that we can never truly have a full accounting for, as the newest discovered mass graves of our relatives painfully remind us today.

As we mourn the loss of our loved ones and relatives, murdered and discarded after being violently stolen from us, we don’t forget the who or the why. For over 100 years the churches have used these schools to destroy us, to “kill the indian to save the man”.

This has never been a secret.

This is why we reject the entire premise of the Christian faith and its supportive texts. The Bible remains a supportive tool to persecute Indigenous people. Rejecting this tool is vital to the continuation of supporting Indigenous people and our livelihood. We ask our supporters to join us in burning the Bible as an act of solidarity and to send a message to Christian faiths that we will no longer allow this tool to exist in our spaces.

Why We’re Burning Bibles

#everychildmatters
#bibleburner

An Epistle to Friends Regarding Community, Mutual Aid and LANDBACK

Dear Friends,

The measure of a community is how the needs of its people are met. No one should go hungry, or without shelter or healthcare. Yet in this country known as the United States millions struggle to survive. The capitalist economic system creates hunger, houselessness, illness that is preventable, and despair. A system that requires money for goods and services denies basic needs to anyone who does not have money. Black, Indigenous, and other people of color (BIPOC) are disproportionately affected. Systemic racism. The capitalist system that supports the white materialistic lifestyle is built on stolen land and genocide of Indigenous peoples, and the labor of those who were enslaved in the past or are forced to live on poverty wages today.

Capitalism is revealed as an unjust, untenable system, when there is plenty of food in the grocery stores, but men, women and children are going hungry, living on the streets outside. White supremacy violently enforces the will of wealthy white people on the rest of us.

It has become clear to some of us who are called Friends that the colonial capitalist economic system and white supremacy are contrary to the Spirit and we must find a better way. We conscientiously object to and resist capitalism and white supremacy.

capitalism has violated the communities of marginalized folks. capitalism is about the value of people, property and the people who own property. those who have wealth and property control the decisions that are made. the government comes second to capitalism when it comes to power.

in the name of liberation, capitalism must be reversed and dismantled. meaning that capitalistic practices must be reprogrammed with mutual aid practices. 
Des Moines Black Liberation Movement

Mutual Aid

How do we resist? We rebuild our communities in ways not based upon money. Such communities thrive all over the world. Indigenous peoples have always lived this way. Generations of white people once did so in this country. Mutual Aid is a framework that can help us do this today.

The concept of Mutual Aid is simple to explain but can result in transformative change. Mutual Aid involves everyone coming together to find a solution for problems we all face. This is a radical departure from “us” helping “them”. Instead, we all work together to find and implement solutions.  To work together means we must be physically present with each other. Mutual Aid cannot be done by committee or donations. We build Beloved communities as we get to know each other. Build solidarity. An important part of Mutual Aid is creating these networks of people who know and trust each other. When new challenges arise, these networks are in place, ready to meet them.

Another important part of Mutual Aid is the transformation of those involved. This means both those who are providing help, and those receiving it.

With Mutual Aid, people learn to live in a community where there is no vertical hierarchy. A community where everyone has a voice. A model that results in enthusiastic participation. A model that makes the vertical hierarchy required for white supremacy impossible.

Commonly there are several Mutual Aid projects in a community. The initial projects usually relate to survival needs. One might be a food giveaway. Another helping those who need shelter. Many Mutual Aid groups often have a bail fund, to support those arrested for agitating for change. And accompany those arrested when they go to court.

LANDBACK

The other component necessary to move away from colonial capitalism and white supremacy is LANDBACK.

But the idea of “landback” — returning land to the stewardship of Indigenous peoples — has existed in different forms since colonial governments seized it in the first place. “Any time an Indigenous person or nation has pushed back against the oppressive state, they are exercising some form of landback,” says Nickita Longman, a community organizer from George Gordon First Nation in Saskatchewan, Canada.

The movement goes beyond the transfer of deeds to include respecting Indigenous rights, preserving languages and traditions, and ensuring food sovereignty, housing, and clean air and water. Above all, it is a rallying cry for dismantling white supremacy and the harms of capitalism.

Returning the Land. Four Indigenous leaders share insights about the growing landback movement and what it means for the planet, by Claire Elise Thompson, Grist, February 25, 2020

What will Friends do?

It matters little what people say they believe when their actions are inconsistent with their words.  Thus, we Friends may say there should not be hunger and poverty, but as long as Friends continue to collaborate in a system that leaves many without basic necessities and violently enforces white supremacy, our example will fail to speak to mankind.

Let our lives speak for our convictions.  Let our lives show that we oppose the capitalist system and white supremacy, and the damages that result.  We can engage in efforts, such as Mutual Aid and LANDBACK, to build Beloved community. To reach out to our neighbors to join us.

We must begin by changing our own lives if we hope to make a real testimony for peace and justice.

We remain, in love of the Spirit, your Friends and sisters and brothers.

Judy Plank

My friend and fellow Quaker, Judy Plank, has given me permission to share some of her stories.

I’ve written about the background of my grandchildren whose mother’s came from Dakota and Lakota nations in my book. Even as a child I was attracted to what I supposed was the life and culture of the tribes that had thrived in our area before the white colonists arrived. I thought our lives were so boring and unimaginative compared to the lives they lived.

That aside, my experiences with those inlaws and my deep deep love for my grandchildren has drawn me even further into knowledge to the near irrepairable damage done to their lives and culture. I love all my grandchildren with all my heart.

I had a chance meeting at our Le Mars Dairy Queen the fall before the pandemic, with a young native man with a logo on his T-shirt that I was attracted to. He was there with his two children, as their mother was working there. I got into a conversation with him, and he shared that he had attended the Flandreau Indian School, where decades before my grandson’s mother had lived and his other grandmother had been a cook. This young man seemed to have had a very good experience there (the school is still in operation, I believe). From that short conversation, I don’t know how connected he was with his culture and what the school was now teaching, if anything, to continue or revive their culture. He was living in Le Mars, where native people are really scarce.

It’s a miracle that any part of the various native cultures still survive given the relentless violence to wipe it out completely. Yet, reviving some of that culture and reverence for the earth that gives us life as these people traditionally practiced, may well be what saves us from destroying ourselves. I attended a talking circle some years ago facilitated by a man I greatly respect from the Yankton nation, who lived in Sioux City. He referred to all people, creatures and things as our relatives. I try to consistently remember to treat all as relatives in my own life. He’s currently in the process of moving to Sioux Falls, but I communicate with him via Facebook.
I’m very happy that finally a native is in charge of the Dept. of Interior. I hope that will change the culture of that department for the better. Other than that, I don’t have much to offer about how to repair the damage done. It will take generations, I fear, before the wrong can be wiped clean.

As I see it, the reason the past boarding schools era is still relevant is the repercussions still today of that trauma of taking children from their families and unthinkable disruption to the culture, language, and family life for the tribal people is still affecting the people to this day. We can be unaware of the entire episode, but they still live with that trauma. What we can do now, is recognize the hurt, listen and learn from the learned history of the tribes as to how to treat the land we live on, and to return as best we can land and lives of these people. How that can best be done, I’m not sure, but many ways must be tried to repair the damage.

 I was horrified to read about the treatment in Pipestone. I was just in Pipestone this past Friday. My grandson and I visited my daughter’s grave in the Catholic cemetery there while we were in Pipestone. The Catholic cemetery overlooks the National Monument to the east. Nick and I spent time driving through the other two cemeteries next to the Catholic one. I found an area that had a couple rows of maybe 50 or so unmarked stones that really interested me. I still wonder if those were graves, and if so, who was buried there. If I had the energy, I’d try to find out the answer, especially after reading this story about the Pipestone school,

LANDBACK and Quakers. A case study

The idea of “landback” — returning land to the stewardship of Indigenous peoples — has existed in different forms since colonial governments seized it in the first place. “Any time an Indigenous person or nation has pushed back against the oppressive state, they are exercising some form of landback,” says Nickita Longman, a community organizer from George Gordon First Nation in Saskatchewan, Canada.

The movement goes beyond the transfer of deeds to include respecting Indigenous rights, preserving languages and traditions, and ensuring food sovereignty, housing, and clean air and water. Above all, it is a rallying cry for dismantling white supremacy and the harms of capitalism. Although these goals are herculean, the landback movement has seen recent successes, including the removal of dams along the Klamath River in Oregon following a long campaign by the Yurok Tribe and other activists, and the return of 1,200 acres in Big Sur, California, to the formerly landless Esselen Tribe.

Returning the Land. Four Indigenous leaders share insights about the growing landback movement and what it means for the planet, by Claire Elise Thompson, Grist, February 25, 2020

There are several reasons I’ve been praying, studying, and writing about LANDBACK. Most importantly my Native friends have told me the best way to support them is by doing so. Those who work for justice often hear we need to follow the leadership of the communities impacted by injustice. It is often not clear how to go about doing that.

I’ve been a bit apprehensive about trying to get Friends involved with LANDBACK because many Friends have trouble dealing with the history of Quakers’ involvement with the forced assimilation of Native children. Many white Friends have trouble dealing with Quakers’ history related to enslavement. Many white Friends are uncomfortable with their white privileges today.

So I was very grateful to receive a response to something I’d written about LANDBACK from my friend and fellow Quaker, Marshall Massey, which you can read here: Marshall Massey on LANDBACK – LANDBACK Friends

I wrote the following case study, hoping to give an example of the implementation of the ideas related to LANDBACK.

This is a link to the PDF version of the LANDBACK case study, Wet’suwet’en and Quakers.

Iowa Yearly Meeting (Conservative) Minute 2019

To this day we have not come to grips with fundamental injustices our country was built on, the cultural genocide and theft of land from Native Americans, the enslavement of African Americans and the legal justifications of bestowing rights and privileges on white land-owning men. The consequences of these injustices continue to plague our society today. And will continue to impact us until we do what is necessary to bring these injustices to light and find ways to heal these wounds.

Several Friends recently assisted Boulder Meeting Friend, Paula Palmer, to lead workshops and discussions as part of her ministry “toward right relationships with Native people.” Part of the tragedy of the theft of Native land is that some Native people don’t have the concept of land as property, belonging to a landowner. Rather they have a spiritual connection to Mother Earth, that the land is sacred and not something that can be claimed as property by anyone. Being forced to leave their land broke their spiritual bonds with the land.

Native people have asked us to begin work toward reconciliation and healing. The first step needed is truth telling, recognizing that injury or harm has taken place. One of the important parts of holding “right relationship” workshops is to determine which Native nations were on the land before white settlers arrived.

–Iowa Yearly Meeting (Conservative) 2019

Marshall Massey on LANDBACK

As far as archæology can tell, no one actually lived on any of the land within fifty miles of where I, personally, live, until the 1870s, when whites came to use it for transshipment. It was too dry and barren and empty to support people who just lived *here*. There’s a part of the Bighorn River Canyon about 90 miles southeast of me, where very small numbers of people like the Anasazi lived in Anasazi-style cliff dwellings, at about the time of the Anasazi, perhaps 800 or 1200 years ago. They fished the streams, hunted the nearby hills, and probably cultivated small patches of ground. But that was long before horses arrived, and they had no real reason to come the long distance (it would have been a week or more on foot) from where they dwelt to where I live, except perhaps in curiosity about what the land looked like.

By the time the natives of my area had horses, my area, along with most of the broad stretch of land from the Bighorn to the Rocky Mountain Front — 400 miles and more miles across — was an area that the nearest tribes (Crow and Blackfeet) hunted buffalo and other prey on horseback in, but did not settle in, and did not regard as a possession. They rode across it, from their own edge to the other tribe’s edge, to raid the other tribe’s dwellings on the far side, to steal horses and count coup and work revenge. They spoke of this to the European-Americans: “This all belongs to the Great Spirit,” they said, “and the Great Spirit meant us to have the use of it, but not to own it.” If you want an exact quotation, here is Crowfoot, a chief among the Blackfeet, speaking some time around 1885: “We cannot sell the lives of men and animals; therefore we cannot sell this land. It was put here for us by the Great Spirit and we cannot sell it because it does not belong to us.”

We have a similar testimony in the Bible — would you believe it? Funny coincidence. “The earth is YHWH’s,” it says, “and the fullness thereof.” (YHWH is a Hebrew word which some modern scholars believe began as a representation of the great wind that fills all the sky, or the great breath that animates all beings: the great spirit.) You may know this passage: it appears in Deuteronomy 10:14 and Psalm 24:1, and is repeated in I Corinthians 10:26. Not that the Bible matters much to liberal activists any more, though; most of them would much, much rather get the same teaching from some other source, anywhere else but their own tradition. Nonetheless, this teaching in the biblical tradition is why the believers in the early Church held all things in common and committed all their resources to look after one another. How can anyone really own what God has put in place for all, especially in cases where someone else has an unmet need? Deuteronomy and Psalms represent wisdom teachings that date back three thousand years, and were I a betting man, I would bet the wisdom of non-possession goes back to the dawn of thought about such things — millions of years back, to when our ancestors and the ancestors of chimpanzees were one people.

I have begun to think that many modern Americans — including, unfortunately, many modern, Westernized native Americans, and at least equally unfortunately, also many modern Quakers — will never, never let themselves comprehend the idea of non-ownership. Their souls are too far shriveled. Surely the land must have been someone’s property, whenever there was anyone even remotely able to make a claim. But this was the testimony of the natives of that time, and of Friends as well. And I believe it is the truth. You might as well claim that somebody owns the sun.

–Marshall Massey