My writings - and those of others.
Learning
When we encounter something we see is wrong, we automatically want to fix it - which hardly ever works. Right now we are dealing with the pre-eminent failures of our country and the wider world to address the two issues of our day - systematic racism and climate emergency. How we got here requires much study and reflection - but also the worldview we have inherited that put us where we are. I am working hard to understand the latter but for today I’ll look at what struck me most profoundly I didn’t know about the Indian Act from Bob Joseph’s excellent short book. It’s almost all of it. I was pleased to see an interview with him in the Globe and Mail this morning.
For a more global view of systemic racism the UN statement here is a good place to start.
These are the things among Joseph’s 21 that are most damaging
First nations had systems of government based on heredity that worked for them. We imposed an elected system that did not meet their needs and competed with their own. The traditional leadership often continued with different responsibilities allocated to the two systems, creating the same kind of disputes and confusion that we already live with between federal and provincial areas of jurisdiction.
Women had no status from 1869 to 1985. If a woman married a non status person, she lost her own status and had to leave the reserve. If a male married a person without status, that person was granted status on the reserve. Since women played a significant role in traditional leadership - and often succession was from a matrilinial line, this was a further outrage.
People were placed on reserves from 1876 until today. This meant that people were moved from the land they used with care and viability to places where they more often than not had little ability to flourish. Even then the government reserved the right to take reserve land away for public works.
They took away their names and gave them European ones. As the last of my branch of a family that can list its ancestors back several centuries, I can only imagine the effect of this.
They needed a permit to sell produce from farms - because their produce would compete with that those on the lands that were taken from them.
They could not buy guns, alcohol or go to pool halls.
Worship ceremonies were illegal. (They had to go underground - and they did.)
They couldn’t even leave the reserve without the permission of an Indian Agent.
That is enough outrage for one day. We will have to continue with more of it - and reckon with what is still in force.
A shameful history
All countries like to celebrate their achievements. So do people on social media these days, who seem to assume that their meals, children’s graduations, hair styles and the like merit interest and praise from the rest of us. I am surprised that some people I know do this so often. We’re much less apt to cite our failures - as individuals or as nations. That would reveal how vulnerable we really are behind these facades of achievement.
But is time to come to terms with reality. As Canadians we thought that people who had been here fourteen thousand years earlier needed to be taught how to live, how to dress, what language to speak and how to worship their creator. We took young children from their parents and placed them in residential schools where we abused them physically and sexually, transmitted our diseases. starved them and buried them in unmarked graves. We left a legacy to the generations that followed them. many who are still among us.
In answer to all the “Buts” and “What Abouts” of Canadian history, the best response is to pause and look at the current realities - as both individuals and institutions where we have connections. What have we to learn from a suffering people? What do they have to teach us now?
The recommendation of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission are here. It’s time for temperature taking and further action. Suffering takes time to heal. But denying the changes that need to happen doesn’t even allow healing to start. Not all actions are our personal responsibility - but both as individuals and institutions, some clearly are.
Honoring the Four Directions
On this National Indigenous Peoples Day in Canada, there is no better way to spend it than to watch this video:
It is especially worth seeing while remembering Ginny Doctor, the Executive Producer who also appears in the film. She died recently. May she rest in peace. To know and understand the Doctrine of Discovery and its impact on all our lives is necessary and she could not have left us a better legacy for reflection and action.
A prayer for people of all faiths - or no faith:
Come Great Spirit, as we gather in your name.
We face East:
To your symbol colour Red, the hue of revelation;
To your animal symbol the Eagle, strong and nurturing;
To your lessons calling us to the balance of your Spirit in Harmony with brothers and sisters;
To invoke your wisdom and grace, the goodness of the ages, We pray: COME HOLY SPIRIT, COME.
We turn to face South:
To your symbol colour Gold for the morning star.
To your symbol Brother Sun that enlightens our intellect and brings light on our path to live responsibly;
To your lessons calling us to balance of Mind in the Spirit of humility;
To invoke your spirit of illumination and far sighted vision;
Help us to love you and one another with our whole heart, our whole mind, and our whole soul, We pray: COME HOLY SPIRIT, COME.
We turn to face West:
To your symbol colour Black, still and quiet.
To your animal symbol the Thunderbird;
To your symbol the Thunder mighty and purposeful;
To your lessons calling us to balance our emotions in the spirit of Gentleness and Honesty;
To invoke your spirit of introspection, seeing within; Give us your strength and the courage to endure, We pray: COME HOLY SPIRIT, COME.
We turn to face North:
To your symbol colour white of clarity and brightness.
To your animal symbol the swan which brings us in touch with Mother Earth and growing things;
To your lessons calling us to balance of our Body in the spirit of a good sense of humor;
To invoke your spirit of innocence, trust and love; Help us to open our eyes to the sacredness of every living thing, We pray: COME HOLY SPIRIT, COME.
(Note: There are several interpretations of the colours of the medicine wheel. A Cree adaptation is used here.)
The Ecological Age
This quotation from Thomas Berry’s The Dream of the Earth is of the utmost importance:
“Presently we are entering another historical period. one that might be designated as the ecological age. I use the term ecological in its primary meaning as the relationship of an organism to its environment, but also as an indication of the interdependence of all the living and nonliving systems of Earth. This vision of a planet integral with itself throughout its spatial extent and its evolutionary sequence is of primary importance if we are to have the psychic importance to undergo the psychic and social transformations that are being demanded of us. These transformations require the assistance of the entire planet, not merely the forces available to the human. It is not simply adaptation to a reduced supply of fuels or to some modification of our systems of social or economic controls. Nor is it some slight change in our education system. What is happening is something of a far greater magnitude. It is a radical change in our mode of consciousness. Our challenge is to create a new language, even a new sense of what it is to be human. It is to transcend. not only national limitations, but even our species isolation, to enter into the larger community of living species. This brings about a completely new sense of reality and value.
How to See
I’ve spent two hours a week this year taking an online course in abstract watercolour painting. The course and others are offered by Avenue Road Arts School, which used to be an actual place and has gone digital for a while. That means that people can join in from any where, rather than just in Toronto as I used to do. The instructor, Sadko Hadzihasanovic, has established an international reputation, but still enjoys working with amateurs and sharing his insights with energy and new technological skills to help us over Zoom. We can email our works in progress and he often make suggestions of small changes in the images on his ipad and sends them back. Often it’s composition where we need help from an experienced eye.
Sometimes abstracting helps us reconnect with the real world. Taking an idea to the next step and putting it into a visual framework we know can send a message that moves us to new understanding. “Poets are the unacknowledged legistrators”, the poet Shelley said. So are any artists who help us to return to learning through our five senses.
San Francisco Artist Ana Teresa Fernandez recently sat down with Bill McKibben to speak about her social sculptor, On the Horizon. It was a response to a comment she heard that sea level will rise six feet in the next fifty years. That’s a nice abstract number, but what does it look like? Her answer as a creator was to put a six foot tube on the beach, fill it to the top with the help of children who will face that reality and let viewers of all ages respond to it.
You can see it here:
What does it look like? How will it change us? Why is this happening? Artists ask the questions that in our day to day pre-occupations we avoid. We need them th help us see what we are doing to ourselves.