I remember when I was a kid. We would play games like Hide-and-Seek in the neighborhood around my house. My mom would say, “Come home when the streetlights come on.” Inevitably, I would get wrapped up in the fun and fail to notice the lights. I might still be hiding if it wasn’t for my mom who would notice my absence, stick her head out the door and call, “Paul”. Following that voice, I would go home.
First Nations children were taken from their mothers to be raised “properly” in the confines of residential school. Like fruit picked too early, these children were taken from their sustaining source before they were ripe and ready for independent life. Torn from their roots and stripped of their culture, they were robbed of both their connection to the earth and their way to spirit. Lost, without cultural identity, these kids had no voice calling them home. No place of love and protection that offered tools and helped them along the journey of discovering themselves.
Many First Nation Bands share the Legend of White Buffalo Calf Women. The story tells how the People had lost their ability to communicate with Creator. To help them, Creator sent the sacred White Buffalo Calf Woman to teach the People how to pray with the Pipe. Along with the Pipe, seven sacred ceremonies were given – The Sweat, The Healing Ceremony, The Naming Ceremony, The Marriage Ceremony, The Adoption Ceremony, The Vision Quest and The Sundance. By following these ways, the People were able to live in harmony, peace and balance, walking the spiritual path.
Ceremonies are the connecting link to spirit. They provide ways to keep the mind pure, clean and unified with the natural flow of life. The mind is the connecting link between heaven andearth. A cluttered, undisciplined mind can block spiritual connection and imprison the soul in the physical realm. In this condition, the only solace of the lost soul is the comfort of family and friends. Residential children often had neither. They were taken from both their loved ones and the spiritual practices that kept their minds healthy and well.
In the picture to the right, the White Buffalo represents the pure mind where all 7 colours of the rainbow are unified into one. One with spirit, the buffalo faces the struggles of life with optimism and determination, knowing that every moment is given by spirit with meaning and purpose. This understanding connects the heavenly realm of spirit (the yellow circle of spirit represented life-giving sun) and life on earth (represented by the land that supports the buffalo walk). Stolen from the White Buffalo way, First Nations children were trapped in a world between. A world of a lost mind not sure from where it came or where it is to go.
Ironically, our children aren’t so different today. Similar to how white culture stole the First Nations children from their culture and spirituality, we have, for the most part, done the same to our own children through the continued secularization of our society and modern worship of the rational mind.
I remember travelling throughout Mexico over the course of two months. I made the acquaintance of an American fellow who was working quite closely with the Mayan people to introduce modern farming methods to their way of life. I’ll never forget what he told me. The Mayan people with whom he worked felt that the Western world had, “sold their children for prosperity”. In many ways, it’s true, isn’t it? Most modern families are dual income earners with the kids outsourced to daycare or education systems. Few children are growing in the shadow of their parents tending or taught ways to connect with spirit. Rather, education is based on, not finding yourself but, how to thrive and survive financially in a material world. We all need the ways of the white buffalo. We all need to learn to pray with the Pipe to communicate with spirit. We’re born with a sacred pipe in the centre of our bodies. The spine is the stem and the pelvis the bowel. The fire of life resides there and through ceremony and practice we can, once again, learn to communicate with it.
Today, take a moment to sit silently and consider all of the First Nations children that never returned from the residential schools. Think of them in a good way. May your good thoughts free them from their earthly plight and call them home to spirit. Then may we restore environments of love and spiritual practice that nurture the growth of ourselves and all children, inspiring a positive future for all.